Testosterone Boys & Harlequin Girls
by her name is erika
Summary: What a bunch of messes we are. For Raven. [AU]
1. Prologue: Part I

**Testosterone Boys & Harlequin Girls  
** **Show:** Young and the Restless  
 **Summary:** What a bunch of messes we are. For Raven. [AU]  
 **Notes:** I wasn't expecting to write this, but last night Twitter imaginations inspire this. It's a tad dark and it's been a while since I've written something like this. This prologue was getting a tad long. So, I've decided to split it because there are so many stories and many SORAS'ed characters to introduce before I intertwine their stories together because it all makes sense in the end. Bear with me. Forgive any typos. I'll do a better edit in the morning.  
 **Disclaimer:** Nope.

* * *

 **PROLOGUE  
PART I**

* * *

 **katie abbott**

They said she could kill and kiss you at same time and that just behind piercing blue eyes lay a monster with claws and fangs. They said she carried poison and tasted of vodka and acid. They said behind her pleasure came pain. They said behind ice cooler than the woman who bore her burned a white hot fire hotter than the man who spawned her. To the strangers who watched the heiress with equal curiosity and fear, they were rumors. To those who close enough, it was the truth.

Katherine Abbott slept on a Thursday evening after walking out of a psychology she had aced and simply driving home frm GCU for the last time. It wasn't that she was any good at school, or that she didn't love it. On the contrary, she did. But it was a waste of her time and much preferred to be in the world instead of learning about it. She parked into the empty driveway and sighing over the bullshit that was school, Katie walked around the back of her house to the garage apartment she had bought from her parents. Mom and Dad's faces were priceless and due to smart investing like Grandpa taught her, she wasn't broke. Far from it. Katie was too independent for her parents to understand or handle.

With the upward swing of a nicotine buzz, she walked into her home away from home. It was decorated with framed photos of fearless but dead women, lavender and dark purple walls. There was wooden night table on the left of her bed with a framed photo of her parents.

More framed photos sprinkled the apartment here and there. Different family members. Different moments in time. Different occasions. She had the place expanded a little bit to make room for a decent yet functioning kitchen and the bathroom was a maze but easy for her to be found. Katie sighed, dropping her tote on the floor, peeling off her black ankle boots and dropping those too. If Mom and Dad got on her case about cleaning, Katie would deal with it. Or not. Her pounding throbbed and pounded so she sank into her bed and closed her eyes to silence sound, forget about time, and expand her sense of space.

Her hearing picked up the sounds of expensive shoes and she smiled at the familiar cologne hitting her nose.

Katie opened an eye and then the other and the intruder of sorts smirked at her.

A smirk of her own touched her red lips. Katie laughed and rolled over at her stomach while he sat on the edge of her bed, uncharacteristically sweet with her by dropping a kiss in her dark hair.

"It seems, niece, you've been busy shaking up the entire Newman hierarchy."

Katie held back a laugh and shook her head, with a thrill of amusement.

"I don't think it rings a bell, but it's nice to see you," she answered innocently. "What damage could little old me possible do?"

"Oh, I think you can do plenty, and you have."

"Aunt Abby will be fine," she waved a dismissive hand, nails painted a dark blood-coloured red ironically called Wicked. She laughed, remembering her cousin, Ava, slapping her for screwing with her mother just last week. Katie let it pass because they were blood. They were family. The next time Ava felt the need to do it she'd snap that little wrist to pieces and break every finger. That was a promise. Uncle Stitch was a doctor. She would be okay and back to preaching to her. "It's not my fault if suddenly, the throne is open at Newman. Mom is truly happy at Brash and Sassy, Noah has the Underground essentially and you're killing it with that hedge found."

Adam raised an eyebrow and glanced down at her.

"You've planned it all it out, haven't you?"

"History says you've done your share of chess playing. My mother seemed to have been on that list."

"Touche. Now, my sons, however…"

She was nonchalant there. After all, wasn't the story of two boys fighting over the same girl one old as time? She hadn't started anything. Katie merely tried to be a good cousin and offer Christian sound advice where Bella was concerned. No risk, no reward. While Christian suppressed it all he liked, Newmans always went by instinct. Some were sharper than others but there.

 _Okay, fine! I like her. I could love her, but Bella won't even look at me._

 _Right. I wonder why._

 _Who put gravel in your cigarettes today?_

 _No one. But your whining is irritating. If you're tired of worshipping Bella from afar, show her you're just as worthy of her. By any means necessary._

 _And if I fail?_

 _Weed is a wonderful thing, Christian. But you won't fail._

"They're in love with the same girl. That narrative was there before I showed up."

"Ah!" Adam said, snapping his fingers as if stumbling on a new revelation, glowing in the darkness of confusion and conundrums. "There's the admission."

"Nope. You're cold."

Adam smirked as if daring her. Weirdly enough, he understood her most and because of that, Katie was prone to vulnerability with him. She wasn't ready to be vulnerable with anyone. Besides, life was much more boring otherwise. "Am I now?"

"Yes. All I did today," Katie said finally, with a grin, "was drop out of college."

She let a comfortable silence marinate between her and uncle. Today, Katie did something as trivial as raising a forearm to glance at the cursive tattoo etched into her skin. _Let it bleed,_ it read.

All it took was a trip to Newman, a discrete stroke of her pen, and legal verification.

 _Let them bleed,_ the tattoo screamed loudest.

—

"Hey, Uncle Adam," Katie said, leaning against her door when she walked him out. The moon shone but the clouds dimmed it and there were no stars. She twirled the silver ring of keys around finger deftly and caught them in her palm. "Thanks for these—the keys to your old place. I know it's nuts. It's way too big. I'm a little too young to be living out there alone and you gave it to me freely. I don't know…" she sighed, raking a hand through her hair, growing wilder by the minute. "I do love it. It's almost too perfect for me to have."

He placed his hands gently against the sides of her head and pressed his lips to her forehead. There was the shadow of a smile on the corners of his lips.

But the shadows. Adam understood them.

"People like us. We fall down trapdoors to nothing, but we land. You'll land and when you do, Katie," he said, softly, "you'll make earthquakes. We can be monsters and thrive. You deserve every bit of independence. You'll kick down your own doors."

"Okay, leave so my cold, dead heart can stay that way, old man."

Her uncle finally grinned with a twinkle in his eye, and walked into darkness that seemed to welcome him. Katie closed the door, locked it and dove into the folds of her bed for her phone. She scrolled through her contacts until she found the right number.

Three rings and a familiar voice with its low timbre settled comfortably in her ears. She loved him and they had a friendship that started in pre-school and grew deeper as they aged and life's complexities got in the way. With every new grade came a new social group that encircled them, never came between them. There was a first kiss in eighth grade, a high school relationship that began and ended in the tenth grade which resulted in a mutual loss of virginity. There was the navigation of sexual maturity and in her case, sexual epiphanies and a fluidity that transcended the social labels of attraction between them. There were fights that made her crazy with rage, bristled with her own stubbornness and in the end, heavy with a rare admission that she had, in fact, been wrong.

Other times, Katie's friendship with him had emotional aspects too. There was still love. It wasn't the kind of love that had romance at the end of the road. She wasn't that kind of woman and if he was going to find romance, Katie knew it wasn't going to be with her. There were powerful feelings of respect, the heart stopping need to be his friend for the rest of her life into whatever next life they landed, and the intensity of wanting to be close to him. Most friendships would deteriorate under the gravity of that closeness but not theirs. They could start and stop being that close with no weird pretenses at all. They could always be friends, friends with benefits and go into friends that loved each other completely regardless.

"Hey, stranger. Get over here. I'm in the mood for…celebrating."

He laughed, "There are many kinds of celebrating."

"Well," Katie released a deep sigh as she lay on her back and the intensity settled in her core. "it's the kind of celebrating that doesn't need underwear. Or, much of anything at all."

Another laugh. One of his belly laughs.

"Damn, girl. You wildin' today?"

"Always. Ah, I love how you know me," Katie answered, with a hint of seduction laced in her voice. She made no effort to conceal it from him. She never could hide much of anything from him. "You down?"

"I smoked Charlie in ball today…"

"You didn't smoke shit!" Katie chuckled at Charlie Ashby's rebuttal in the background.

"Man, go home and fix your broken ankles!" she heard her best friend yell at his nephew, although they were more like brothers. He came back with another laugh and sounded as if he was feeling the movement of their flirtatious dance and had decided he was all in. "I'm down. I'll come through in 15."

"I'll be waiting, Winters."

Katie hung up before Moses could take the last word away from her although sometimes, he'd let her have it.

The night was still young and all hers.

* * *

 **moses winters**

"'I'll come through in 15'," Charlie imitated, with a roll of his eyes. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah. You know Katie's been my girl from way back."

Moses casually bounced the orange ball between his legs before he effortlessly sunk a three point. He liked the rhythm of the basketball bouncing against the pavement. It tapped a beat that would be the backdrop against his spoken word poetry. He had enjoyed the exertion and the sweat of the game and the sun beating against his back. It was a nice distraction from complications that seemed to plague him at every turn. Well, it was just one complication and for a little while, he needed to forget it.

He tossed Charlie the ball and they walked from Chancellor Park's ball court on the path that led to the benches. The parking lot was on the other side. Moses hitched his gym bag on his shoulder and heard the distant jingle of his car keys as he walked with his nephew – although they were more brothers.

Charlie glanced at him with a furrowed brow when they stopped walking.

"Okay, and?"

"And," Moses argued back, with a shrug. "I'm going to go chill with her."

"Nah. You're gonna go fuck her."

Moses sighed, and said sarcastically, "Thank you, Charlie. You gonna hold my dick while I piss too?" he rubbed a tired hand over his face, body still screaming from the soreness of that basketball game. "I know what she is. I know who she is. You don't think I know she's messed up? Everyone in this town knows that. But I can't judge Katie for her choices."

"So, you're down with them when they hurt people?"

"No. I'm not. But, man, I'm not going to do that to my friend. Not when she's had my back," Moses said, sincerely and gestured to Charlie's hand. "I have to deal with your choice of barber when he hates your ass. I mean, your waves are trash—"

"Bro!" Charlie cried, affronted.

"—and your line up is jacked but I fuck with you, because we're family."

"Don't be acting new when she decides to sink her fangs into your neck. Just saying."

He did truly laugh because it was amusing to know that one of his inside jokes with Katie had leaked into public perception. Charlie grew quiet and let out an angry sigh that sounded like his breath had been forced past several knots in his chest. Moses watched Charlie bristle just a little bit and set his jaw.

"What's the matter?"

"Nothing. Look, you have your thing with Katie. Cool. Do you," Charlie said, eyes flashing with simmering anger, the origin unknown to him. "Go do whatever with her," he pulled out his phone and pocketed with a curse underneath his breath. "I gotta go to the coffeehouse. Ava's texting me and I have no idea why."

"Oh, okay. Go deal with it. You know she's feelin' you, right?"

"It's not even… She just came off a bad break-up because Katie stole her boyfriend. You know, your girl. Ava walked in and caught them having sex. She's family by marriage but she's sadistic."

"And I don't see her that way."

"Or, you could just be insane."

"Don't call me blind when Ava got her feelings for you on a neon sign," Moses quipped.

Charlie shrugged, and Moses tried to ignore his nephew turning red.

"Doesn't matter anyway. Ava's going through stuff. I'm not gonna take advantage, and I won't even bring up the fact that she's younger than me, but," Charlie smiled, absentmindedly, "but her spiral's dope."

"Like I said, man, deal with it," Moses said, with a knowing glance and offered a palm for his nephew to slap, to which he did. He clasped hands with Charlie and pulled each other, landing in an embrace before separating. Moses watched his back as Charlie took purposeful steps in the opposite direction until his head disappeared around the corner.

Moses felt his phone buzz against his leg through the fabric of his basketball shorts.

He hitched the strap of his gym bag on his shoulder, glanced at his phone and shoved it back into the pocket of gym shorts.

—

There was a missed call from his dad.

Another from his mom. Three from her.

Moses drove away from Chancellor Park. With the last call from her as Genoa City traffic lights turned red, then amber and then green like club lights he'd danced under, he answered it before the voice beat him to it. She took his first word and held it away from him so it couldn't reach it.

"Moses…"

Her familiar voice spread in the space of his car and there was no room to breathe.

"I know you're there."

"Yeah, I'm here," he answered, sarcastically, stopping at a red light. "How's the happiness going? You done figuring it out?"

"Yes. I don't want to figure things out anymore, Moses. I… was messed up and I needed time. I shouldn't have pushed you away. You're so good to me and it was weird getting that kind of love in return. My dad," he could hear a sigh, "he's amazing. He raised me alone and Heather is Mom, but I'm dealing with heavy stuff not even they can fix. I was and I messed up. I hate myself for doing that."

She sighed, a sharp breath. He could picture the furrow in her brow, the way she tapped her nails against a surface when she was thinking or to the brim with nervous energy. He could feel the skin of her skin against his. The way she smelled of cinnamon and it felt as though Moses was carrying a beautiful, dancing flame in the palms of his hands when he touched her hair.

"You're rambling. Get to what you're telling me, but then again, what more can you possibly telling me when you cheated on me with _him_?"

"It doesn't matter. It never did. know it's infuriating hearing that, okay?"

"Yeah. No shit!" Moses spat and pressed a foot to the acceleration pedal with a little more force than necessary, passing a green light. "I can't do this. I thought I was ready to talk about this with you. But I'm not."

"I'm so sorry I hurt you, Moses," the girl said, a little quieter and sniffled. She spoke with a determination that he still found endearing despite his anger. "When you can do this, come find me. Crimson Lights. I came home to you."

Moses sighed, locking his jaw. She didn't get it. She still didn't get it and that's why they were here.

"I figured."

"I flew in from Bali yesterday. The art gallery is interested in putting some of my pieces in a show. I'm pretty excited."

"That's great," he replied, and meant it. Moses understood her passion for photography and sometimes, that took her to faraway magical places he's only dreamed of going. "I hope you get it. I'm glad you're back. You said you come back for me. Can I ask you something? And please don't lie to me again. I will pull over and smash this car with my bare fists if you do."

"Ask me, Moses."

Moses paused, and then asked, "Would you stay for me?"

"Of course, I would. I'd do anything for you."

Moses remembered the other guy wedged into a significant section of her heart. He was connected to the other girl who had taken his heart and guarded it and sometimes, dropped it because he let her. Moses knew that about her, though. She was off like that but when he had been her best friend for that long, Moses also knew that it was never that kind of love between them.

"Just like you'd do anything for Johnny," he stated, matter-of-factly. "Let's be real here."

Moses gently turned the steering wheel so he had landed at his destination.

"Moses, please—"

He cut her off, quickly, and a little harsher than he intended, but he didn't care. "Look, I have to go. You just got back and I don't want to bother you."

"You're not."

Moses shrugged, "Either way, this conversation isn't helping both of us."

She cursed underneath her breath in frustration. "Fine, but Crimson Lights. Show up. Please."

"Okay, Lucy. I'll show up."

Before she could say goodbye and have another piece of her voice etched painfully into his head and wrapped around his mental expanse, he hung up and parked. Not much made sense to Moses right now, but the only thing that did was going to hang out with his best friend on this earth.

* * *

 **ava rayburn**

She didn't know what hell was like but this was close. Ava Rayburn knew of her grandfather. How could anyone not know who the legend that was Victor Newman? Ava observed what looked like a board meeting. But this was triggered. Her mother had worked hard over the years. In spite of her biases, she felt that her mother did deserve to be CEO. She watched with sharp green eyes adults that were a mix of unfamiliar people in suits and familiar people she loved. Ava was here for the moral support and staying for the impending shit show.

Her mother sat in her chair looking anxious but summoning up confidence. Uncle Nick reluctantly slid into his chair, Aunt Chelsea as Uncle Adam's proxy slid next to Aunt Victoria. What her face didn't say her large blue eyes did. Agitation. Confusion. Exasperation, but the realization that the invisible tether that kept her drawn to everything Newman Enterprises. Then the four board members who looked nothing but robots in grey took their seats around the long table.

Her ears weren't working. Had an eardrum burst? Had something in her brain gone wrong? She knew she was sound and there was movement but she couldn't hear it. Ava twisted a skinny silver on her forefinger to release her nervous energy. The ponytail she thought was cute in the morning felt painfully tight in her blonde hair.

Uncle Nick sighed, shaking his head. Aunt Victoria touched his arm while her eyes clearly asked Mom why this was happening.

The robots were talking, their lips too fast for to read. Ava watched her mother plaster on a smile although it just barely slipped off her face. Aunt Chelsea whispered something to her and she nodded, seeming to be reassured. Ava smiled at this. Aunt Victoria was speaking now, formal and regal as she was. Katie really did resemble her. The room had taken on a biting chill and Ava rubbed her bare arm against the goosebumps on it.

One robot spoke again, face serious and direct at Uncle Nick but Chelsea seemed to intervene on Abby's behalf. In the middle of the static, Ava watched her aunt groan and heard the words escape with a sigh. It seemed to be under her breath, something meant to pierce itself under her skin and twist itself in between every vein, every nerve, every bone and by evidence of tears she forced back, her heart.

Ava forced herself to hear, but her speech was the temporary price.

"As it stands, we are here today to determine whether Abby's short tenure of Chief Executive Officer is extended or if the nomination of Nicholas Newman for CEO will be verified and enacted effectively immediately."

Robot One.

"I'm honoured to have been nominated and if my father were with us, he'd want me to run this company. I'm sure. It's always been his dream that one of carry on his legacy but my sister and I aren't it."

Uncle Nick.

"And if I may speak for my husband, Newman Enterprises isn't his vice anymore. He's found something he's passionate about. We're happy with our boys. Adam doesn't want to be CEO anymore. I've worked with Abby closely on several occasions. She can do this."

Aunt Chelsea.

"And at one point in time, I would have undermined my sister because she wasn't ready, nor was she worthy to be our father's successor but," Aunt Victoria paused, her voice steady and sharp while she locked eyes with Mom, "she's risen to the occasion. I'm first born. It may be worth nothing or worth everything, but I'm appealing to you today, to dissolve this meeting. My sister and I have different styles but she's making it work and I've seen her work hard as my brother and I have in this building. Allow her to have this chance."

Ava breathed a quiet thank you to her aunt and Aunt Victoria's gaze to have caught hers. It wasn't her fault her older cousin had gone from sweet to borderline sociopathic.

Robot Two spoke. A female.

"Be as it may, we need to have the utmost confidence that this company will be solidly run. New experience is a positive aspect but old, tried and true leadership is what will keep this company thriving," she said and Ava wanted to choke that woman. "Victoria. Adam, even you, Nick, have added to the lifeblood of this company. Made impacts that will carry on into the next generation, I'm sure."

Mom stood up, shooting up like a rocket about to be sparked.

"And I will as well!" Mom pleaded, honestly and Ava grinned proudly. "I'm human. I'm prone to mistakes and we all are. But my father taught me – all of us – that when we fall we get up and come back stronger. I've done that. I've made sure this company had stayed in the black and never faltered. Please give the chance to continue that," she glanced down and looked back up with a sure smile. "Thank you."

Robot Three raised an eyebrow, tossing a hawk-eyed gaze at Mom. His beak like nose reminded Ava of a vulture swirling over a corpse.

"Our recollection of the Harrison deal and the manufacturing department faltering speaks louder than what was said here today," he cleared his throat formally. "Here are the quarterly reports."

As Aunt Chelsea scanned the papers and glanced into her lap. Aunt Victoria barely held the gasp locked in her throat and rubbed her temple. Despite his efforts to hide his reaction to their numbers on the page, Uncle Nick flinched. It was as if a switch long untouched had been turned by an invisible hand only she could see. _Oh God._

"Those numbers are still strong enough to be profitable," Mom argued, diplomatically. At least, Ava thought, her mother was fighting. "That division has been difficult, I admit, but I have an excellent team behind me who share the same work ethic I do."

"I bring these quarterly reports for one reason. Consistency. Your work ethic is considered, Abby, but without consistent results, one bad part can damage the whole entity. In any case, manufacturing was your division of expertise, Nick."

Nick looked as if he had been handed a situation with no possible out. How did one escape a burning room when the openings were sealed shut? Ava wondered this.

The first corporate robot stopped being silent and merely said, "The results of this vote are legal and binding. Before we begin, are the nominees here of their own free will?

"Yes," Mom nodded.

Uncle Nick also replied firmly, "Yes."

"Do both nominees forfeit this position? Now is the time to speak."

"No."

Ava expected a quick response from Uncle Nick. He didn't want this. He didn't want the power. He didn't want the suits. Nick was her laidback uncle who was happy to run the Underground on his terms away from Grandpa. But now Grandpa was gone. Grandpa was physically gone and he was no longer there. Only the penetrating gaze from his portrait was enough. He couldn't stop this.

Nick grew quiet and folding his hands on the table. His eyes were apologetic.

"I'm…sorry, Abby," he told Mom sincerely. Ava watched her mother's glossed lips begin to tremble. Chelsea looks at him, surprised. Aunt Victoria looked at him, questioning him.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, Vick…I'm sure," Nick answered her and turned to the rest of the board members. "My answer is no."

With one syllable, voting began. She wanted to look away, but couldn't. It was as if there was a highway crash with the twisted remnants of cars. The human casualties were bloody, bleeding from a roadmap of cuts and bruises. Their flesh burned and the people begged for help while thick smoke choked the lives out of them. People were very difficult to read, her dad said. As a doctor, he could only do so much and while he had lives in his hands every day, it took him years to come to terms with some of those lives having to be let go because medicine wasn't enough. People were the same. They came in one way and left stitched together as something else. It wasn't good or bad. It was just how it was.

What was enough here? Could she intervene? Could she say anything when everything had been spoken? Would her words float through the burgeoning smoke in the room? It was a tie breaker. Three for her mother and three for her uncle. Aunt Victoria was the tiebreaker. Before she could cast her vote and end it, one of the board members spoke, the head of Newman legal walked in only to produce an envelope from his lapel, formally hand it to her aunt and walk out after leaving polite goodbyes.

Aunt Victoria eyed the envelope as everyone in the room including Ava, watched her open it and pull the sheet of paper out. She furrowed a brow, eyes scanning it for several seconds before she gasped, turning angry, shocked eyes to the portrait above them.

"Victoria," Mom questioned, tentatively. "What does that say?"

Chelsea sighed, exasperated. "Victor and his games… What has he done now?"

"Vick…"

"Katherine has had this since she was two. He gave her shares on her second birthday. You would think that wouldn't mean anything since he gave all his grandchildren shares. But he gave Katie a little more than the rest added to the stake I already have which makes me majority shareholder of Newman Enterprises. Even from the grave, he's determined to keep me tethered here. I've made peace. I'm happy at Brash & Sassy and it's thriving. Katie signed these over to me last week."

Chelsea interjected. "How is that valid?"

"I…have to talk to Billy about this. But then I have to wonder if this had anything to do with Katie at all. It's a legal and binding document." Aunt Victoria gazed that the portrait and asked it softly, as if Grandpa were in this room. "Dad, what have you done?"

Ava gasped. The week she had slapped her cousin in the face to defend her mother. Katie had done this to get back at her. This was her fault. She felt tears spring to her eyes and turned away to look out of the window. Ava wanted to focus on the expanse of everything and nothing. Not here. She felt sick and Ava thought of throwing up so both she and her mother had a reason to leave.

"Victoria," Robot One spoke, snapping her aunt out of it. She folded the paper, slide it into the envelope. "Cast your vote."

She sighed, and turned to Mom.

Mom replied her before Aunt Victoria could form any apology of her own. Ava's palms grew clammy and she rubbed them on her fashionably torn jeans.

"It's okay, Victoria. Just do it."

With two more words, Uncle Nick was declared CEO of Newman Enterprises. Congratulations were handed it as the board members filed out. Abby offered her uncle congratulations too, but it was one neither wanted to give or receive. Ava watched the smoke get thicker as that spark gave birth to a flame. Only after her mom ran out of the room with Aunt Chelsea on her heels did Ava get her hearing at the normal decibel and sight with the colours more vivid and everything moving at normal pace.

Ava ran from her spot to the other side of the office to the door. Aunt Victoria stopped her, gently. "Ava, honey…"

She shook her head, "Please stop," she turned her gaze on her uncle and smiled wryly. "Congratulations, Uncle Nick."

"Look, kiddo. Nobody wanted it to go down like this," he started to explain.

"I said, stop. A democratic process put you in that chair."

"I promise I won't leave your mom hanging or minimize her. It's not how I roll."

Her uncle was still that sweet, funny guy if that was any consolation. _It wasn't._

Ava shrugged and turned to her aunt. She sniffled, and against her best efforts, her voice broke. "I still love you, Aunt Victoria. It's not your fault Katie's dead inside because the fact is, your daughter screws with us all. She controls everything. Especially you. Especially Uncle Billy, but you're her mom and you love her too much to see it. We _all_ love her too much."

Aunt Victoria stepped forward, those blue eyes sympathetic and reached out to touch her.

"Sweetie, please—"

Ava jerked away like she had been burned and apologized. "I'm…sorry. I have to go."

This was with hell was. This was what it meant to have flames erupt. This is what it meant to have heat so strongly against your back, it burrowed underneath the skin to the bone. This was finally how it felt to watch smoke blacken and swirl around the room. Instead of watching this office burn with Katie dancing with the flames, Ava Rayburn simply left. She started running, looking for her mother and sanity all at once.

* * *

 **johnny abbott**

He was busy. Johnny was busy living fast and dying in a blaze of glory. Johnny was busy wishing it away, fucking it away, burying it away, snorting it away and drinking _her_ away. It was afternoon blending into evening. It was when the day was in danger of being torn apart by the night. Johnny Abbott would paint Genoa City with Benjamins splotched with the brightest shade of red. They said the son of Billy Abbott and Victoria Newman would die beautiful and young – a James Dean kind of death in the end. They said Johnny Abbott was in a death spiral, floating down into a bottomless abyss and left a white smoke behind him.

Those who were close to him would say he was headed down a dangerously tilted slope. By all accounts, paintings and composite sketches of his character were not all that exaggerated. Johnny was sliding down a slippery slope but when it was slope that went by so fast, everything blurred around him and could stop his heart. When adrenaline was more powerful than whatever drugs he made part of him, where did the problem lie?

Sometimes, they said Johnny was the beauty to Katie's beast too. It depended on who you asked really. With a smirk, Johnny gazed out the grand window of his penthouse apartment. The gold vial of hanging off his neck, glinting in the sunlight. It was one of the perks of being an heir and working actor everyone wanted to a piece of. The nameless, faceless audience reached out to grab and ensnared him with their devotion and money, but never could quite get high to meet him. He swirled the amber liquid in the glass tumbler and drained in one gulp.

He didn't know between he and his sister, who was who.

Depended on the day and situation, Johnny supposed.

—

Johnny set his empty tumbler of bourbon on the counter next to the glass decanter and as if he'd witnessed an award-winning actress work bend fiction into fact, he clapped.

It was slow and the receiver of his applause merely sighed, obviously annoyed. She pocketed her phone, shoving into the back pocket of her jeans. Johnny watched her gently comb her red hair back, all the while glaring at him. Johnny felt the dampness from his shower on his skin, water in his blond hair and let his cotton towel sit low on his hips.

She brought her eyes down and then looked up, a frown in her mouth and annoyance in her furrowed brow.

"Feel free to stare, Lucy. Pretty sure you've missed this while hiding in Bali."

Lucy laughed. "Hardly. There's nothing to miss."

He playfully winced and put a hand to his heart. "Oh, Lucy Romalotti, how you wound me."

"Leave me alone. Live your life or trash it. It doesn't matter to me," she said, steadily. Lucy folded her arms around herself. "Moses is a good guy. He loves me more than I deserve," she sniffled, and angrily wiped a tear away. "What _does_ matter if that I got selfish with you and hurt a good guy. I'll never hurt Moses like again."

"Never?" Johnny inquired, raising an eyebrow and studied her. "Sweetheart, if you truly believe that, then you don't know yourself. Selfish. That word means something terrible to you. You were alive with me. You were free with _me_. You never wanted to stop with _me_."

"Well, I'm stopping now. It's over, Johnny."

Johnny surveyed her. Anger radiated off of her and he smirked. Her red hair looked like it was on fire – a fire that was controlled right now, wild later. They were going to burn each other. They were going to bun _with_ each other. This was what they did.

"I can be _free_ without you."

He shrugged, nonchalant, "Okay, but let me ask you something. If you're so sure you've got me out of your system, out of your mind, and out of your body, why are you here?"

She crosses her arms, and her eyes flashed. The fire in her hair grew in size slightly.

"You know why I'm here."

He shook his head, clicking his tongue in false disdain. "You've picked up the art of deflection in Bali, I see. You still didn't answer my question. Why are you here? Standing in my apartment? With me?"

"To tell you I'm not coming back, ever."

"And yet, you're here. In front of me, here in my apartment and of your own free will. You felt the need to call Winters in front and tell him you missed him, you loved him, and it was going to be you two forever and always," Johnny smirked, stepping towards her. When she went backward, he stepped forward. Lucy took another step backward and Johnny continued to match her. Even now, he marveled, she was still in sync with him even as she wanted to disrupt the status quo. Lucy cursed as her back collided with his door. Johnny placed his hands on her hips, remembering the blueprint of her body. He never forgot it. With the way Lucy bit her bottom lip to force herself from not reacting to him, Johnny could tell in her face, she didn't want to give him the satisfaction. It was seared into his skin as it had been branded into his. "You want to marry Winters in a pure white dress when you'll beg me to tear it to shreds off your body with my bare hands?"

"Get away from me," she hissed, and like a rattlesnake striking, her head flew across his face, exploding with the heat glowing brightly in them.

Johnny stepped back, hands up in surrender.

"Ah, there's my Lucy."

"I don't belong to you!" she screamed, sharply.

"Moses and all that flowery shit is fucking with your head worse than I ever could."

She looked at him, defiant, and shook her head, "Wow, you're unbelievable – you think that's true because you say so? Because yes, we all follow life's rules because of The Gospel According to John Abbott IV."

"It's a good read, Luce. Especially the very long, comprehensive chapter on you."

"Don't!" Lucy snapped again, pointing a finger at him. "Don't you _Luce_ me! Don't—"

Johnny stared at the flames in her hair, dancing and twisting around with its light blue middle. He cut off by pulling in by those hips with his imprints on it and kissed her. It wasn't one with his usual roughness or the kind that let her break at the seams. It was a kiss selfishly for him. His hands settled into the locks of her red hair. She held his face in her hands and kissed him back. Whether it was a reflex, or something she wanted, Johnny didn't care. It was a slow kiss Johnny selfishly wanted to savour, holding on to his fragile rationale before the lust for drugs appeared like a temptress at night and sank its claws into him. He did like the pain though.

Lucy pulled away from him, whispering against his mouth, "No, Johnny. I won't. I swear to God, I won't."

She separated from him, tears filling in her eyes.

Johnny stared her straight in the eye, looking through her instead _at_ her. He could see the tether that kept them connected. It was as strong as titanium and sharp as the spikes of a cactus. That's how he knew. That's why she ran away from him because Lucy could see it, too. He watched her to try to burn it away but only burned herself. Johnny could truly see her and because of that, he smiled at her.

"Okay, go," he simply said, and gestured to the door. "But you will _come_ back, Lucy."

Lucy merely looked at him, glaring as tension take up her body and opened the door. Johnny watched the head of red hair go through the door. It drifted away until the flames were extinguished and the small remnants of his heart turn to ash.

* * *

 **christian newman**

Christian Newman liked to walk. To be quite honest, it was one of his favourite things to. He was a new driver, relieved to get his license although he shared a car with Connor. It was fine with him because driving was never his thing. It was something he had to do because it was practical. But Connor could have the car, just like he already had the girl. _Bella_. Bella Fisher was pretty, beautiful like her name meant. She was really sweet, especially to him. Sometimes, it was confusing and frustrating. Christian never seemed to get the gaze from her Connor did. Bella liked him because she had asked Christian to help make sure, she was nudged in his direction.

Christian sighed, trying to rid of himself so the pressure behind his blue eyes. He rolled an ivory coloured chess piece between his palms as he watched Genoa City move and shift above and below him from the grand window of his penthouse. Suddenly, Christian did not want to be still. He did not want to be stationery. He didn't want to fail, or admit being defeated. Connor was his older brother and he loved him, but he oozed loud bright charm when Christian was aware of reserved intensity.

He was antsy, crawling in his skin so he set the queen chess piece on the black grand piano, grabbed his keys and left the empty penthouse.

As Christian stuck his hands in his pockets and waited for the elevator to take him to the world outside, they opened and revealed his father. His dad fixed him with an inquisitive gaze. Most likely asking him what he was doing leaving the house this late.

"Hi, son."

"Hi, Dad."

The elevator door closed but it was okay because he would wait for the next one. Elevators always came around and Christian knew how to wait.

"It's a little bit late."

"I know," Christian replied, with a barely there smile. "I'm just going to go walk right now."

His dad raised an eyebrow and met his smile. "Where will you travel this time?"

"I don't know, but I don't want to."

Dad chuckled, quietly and Christian could see the lines of aging etched into his father's face and the salt and pepper in his hair, but he was strong and tall. Christian wished and hoped to be that way too, when he was old enough. For now, he'd be young and explore. Christian met his dad eye-to-eye, tall enough although he was skinny and was envious of Connor's tall but muscular structure. Maybe that's why Bella fell all over herself with him.

Dad ruffled his mop of dark hair and Christian didn't mind. But there was one thing Christian had that Connor didn't: a strategic mind, and physical speed in feet that carried him to wherever he was going. So, Christian resolved to take Katie's advice as Machiavellian as she made it sound. Fight for Bella. Be smart. Be strategic for her heart and be so fast Connor couldn't touch him.

"I'll be back, Dad."

"Your mother worries about you, and frankly, so do I."

Christian smiled again at the elevator doors opened again. He stepped into them.

"Please tell her that I love her for it. I love her for everything. I'll be okay, Dad."

"Happy travelling, Christian. Be safe."

"Thank you," Christian said, as the elevator doors closed. When they sealed shut, Christian whispered another thank you. Not to his father, not even to himself. He thanked happenstance, his inner nervousness for allowing him to step outside and thanked for nature for winds. Free flowing air that blew around him and against him.

It was like that song.

Anywhere the wind blew Christian felt it didn't matter. So, he put one foot in front of the other on the sidewalk and pushed forward.


	2. Prologue: Part II

**Testosterone Boys & Harlequin Girls  
** **Notes:** Here's the second part of the prologue. There are so many people to introduce before the story gets started. This will have to be a third part to this prologue because like the first one, this has gotten too long. And it's way darker than I intended but…. Here it is. WELP. Enjoy reading. Forgive any edits. I'll do a better one in the morning. I'm tired and the time difference is still making me its bitch.  
 **Background Music:** Who We Are – Imagine Dragons.

* * *

 **PROLOGUE  
** **Part II  
**

* * *

 **reed hellstrom**

The entertainment industry was really two sides of one very heavy coin. It was either an oasis or a wasteland. Like he could flip a coin. If he got heads, the waves of fame could take him up so high he flew too close to the sun on wax wings. If Reed got tails, he could fall from the sky and rip the clouds open upon descent. So, he chose to stay in the between. Reed chose to stay in the middle between the bright lights of Los Angeles or the seedy underbelly of New York City. He had been through all of it years prior when fame made him so powerful he drank until he bathed in it. With every win, every album going double or even triple platinum, Reed was greedy. Zoey became blurred the more he let his inhibitions walk into the door in his mind and kick it wide open. Alice's voice became more distorted until the only sound left was the breathy moan of a blonde nameless groupie under him as he pounded his hard member into her. Reed was delirious and dizzy, beads of sweat breaking out on his skin with exertion and pleasure.

It was one warm body after the next. One good fuck blurring into the next after alcohol made Reed feel as if he could float out of his body and touch God. Suddenly, the internal duality that had been held together by sanity had come undone by sex, drugs and rock'n' roll—without the drugs. If Reed was under the influence or any drug, it wasn't one that involved the active use of his lungs or a needle in his arm. It wasn't his poison. Like another musician gone wrong and about to choke on their moral vomit, Reed choked. He gagged and gasped for air to be sane again. So, Zoey with her threats of divorce and sole custody of their daughter, Alice Victoria Hellstrom, appeared to him like a dream. She was a mirage, swimming in and out. Here she was extending her hand to him and like a lifeline so Reed took it and never let go again.

—

His day was long. Reed had recording sessions for this forthcoming third solo album and meeting with the label. He and his friends formed _Highway to Anywhere_ in a Genoa City High music room. Now, they were longer no longer sixteen. That highway stopped somewhere, discovering that Reed and his friends had a path going in different directions. So, Highway to Anywhere broke up. Every now and again, they did pop up shows at festivals for the fans with them from the beginning and ones that joined the ride somewhere in between. But it meant Reed was free to explore himself in a way that had no boundaries or limits. The first one had heavier and had dark undertones, sounds of rough electric guitar and minor chords of the grand piano.

Reed remembered writing and put the songs together before they were polished in a studio. He did appreciate other artists who used other ways to enhance their music but he had always been inclined to having his music be organic. Reed didn't intend to become famous but he was. He was well-known, had ways of coping with it and had his family to keep him sane. Of course, he was sane but he felt like the only one. Reed often worried for his mother because Johnny and Katie were messes, although in their own ways, were capable of understanding that love and family were intertwined. He watched Billy hide his pain with jokes, sarcasm and a smile while his Ice Queen mother – he meant that affectionately now because he wasn't fifteen anymore – seemed to crack, often near tears. Reed sometimes found her crying alone and heard her sobs through her bedroom door. If his mother wasn't crying, Reed often saw Billy go into extended periods of silence, eyes fixed on framed pictures as Johnny and Katie as little kids. Sometimes, he stared at the pictures of Delia on the mantle. Delia. Once upon his stepsister, and forever, a kid.

Tonight was one of those nights. Mom stormed upstairs, angrily asking Billy why he wasn't angrier about what Katie had done tonight. When did he sit back and watch their son drive himself into one reckless ditch after the other? When Reed heard the gory details of the board meeting, he was left flummoxed and if it wasn't all so manipulative and disturbing, he would be impressed.

"Billy…" he started to say and stopped. Where did he start? Where could he begin? Reed had a marriage, two kids, and a career of his own and yet, he was aware of the other responsibility he had to carry. It was spawned by a quiet feeling of worry. It was the kind of worry that kept him up most nights when he lied and told Zoey he was worried about his music and any solo work he was working on. Johnny and Katie. His little brother and sister. He told no one but he had the same fears as his mother and stepfather did. Reed often chose to tour so he could keep an eye on Johnny's acting career in ways when the tabloids could not. Katie was harder to monitor and she scared him most.

Billy looked at him, tears forming in his eyes.

"It's not that I don't care, Reed," he replied, quietly. Reed saw a man aged by years and the weight of panic but made youthful by his smile and his humour. He smiled at Reed, wryly and he saw the man through his sixteen-year-old eyes. Billy _only_ had his humour, it seemed. "I care too much. Sometimes, I dream of her. Delia. I picture what she would have been as a mother, a wife…"

Reed smiled, triggered by nostalgia.

"She was the best stepsister ever."

He remembered having silly string fights with her. He remembered pulling pranks on Mom and Billy with her – although he believed now they had let them have the victory. Reed remembered what they were going to do that Halloween. The details were blurred by years but he remembered when Dad had told him of Delia's death vividly. He remembered not understanding why someone like Delia was hurt by anyone. Reed remembered watching Billy be so sad on this very same couch and hugging him because what else could he do? Then he remembered seeing Delia's mom and crying as he hugged and told her he was really going to miss Delia. _Hi Reed,_ Chloe had said to him. _Look at you. You're so big._ Reed did mean that. He would miss her and would never forget Delia. He liked to think they would have been buddies has adults – having kids who played together. Delia's kid would have weird but close cousins with Alice.

"She loved you," Billy said, staring at her picture. He then shifted to gaze to one of Katie and Johnny as kids. She was two. He was five. Reed remembered them that way. He remembered building forts and castles of wooden blocks. Reed remembered Katie being the one to wake him up from school by running into his room and literally, jumping on him. She was his little alarm system. He remembered telling them stories and playing guitar in the house so loud it drove Mom nuts but his brother and sister ran around and danced to it. _You've made them have their own person mosh pit, Reed._ He loved that about them.

"I'm sorry about Mom, man— "

Billy gently cut him off by clapping him on the shoulder. "No," he shook his head. "Take that apology back. It's just her way of coping. I've known your mother for years, been married to her a few times. You're a good man. You look out for them. You look out for your brother and sister. You check on your mother and hey," he shrugged, and smirked, "sometimes, that goodwill lands my way."

"I never got what you guys meant when you said I'd get it when I had a kid. I do now."

Billy nodded slowly and a slow smile settled on his face.

"You want the world for Alice and Holden."

"Yeah," Reed replied, grateful that he was still her father after losing her to his own vices. He knew those vices didn't quite disappear. Reed knew that dark, selfish could snap the stability and sanity he had built. He knew he could build new vices worse the first ones. He knew of one person who personified the darkness that lay beneath the surface yet shined with light that seemed to shine for. There was her. Always _her_. Every night, he woke up and watched his daughter sleep. Alice wasn't so little anymore but she would always be his little girl. When he held Holden, his three-month-old son, in his arms, Reed saw new beginnings in those bright blue eyes. "I want everything for them."

"Johnny and Katie are all I have left. They are the only pieces of myself I have left on this Earth. It's not that I don't care or I've given up," Billy grew sad, a shadow of sorts slowly erased his humor and settled on his face. His eyes carried that sadness in them again. "I'm just grateful they're alive and breathing."

Now, it was Reed's turn to place a hand on Billy's slumped shoulder. The lump growing in Reed's throat was painful as he swallowed. Reed watched Billy stare at his palms, the empty space between his arms.

"I used these hands to touch Katie when she slept just to feel her chest rise and fall," Billy said, voice quiet and far away. "Johnny used to fit perfectly in the space between my arms. Now…" he trailed off and raised tearful eyes to him. "…I want them to bury me, Reed. I want them to bury me, Reed…"

Reed understood what it meant. What Billy wanted. What Billy feared. What it meant if Billy had to face that tragic kind of reversal, once or twice more.

"I know, Billy," Reed said, quietly as he forced his own sadness down. "I know."

—

Reed felt exhaustion settle into the marrow of his bones, pushing him to let it seep out of him the same way. He could have opened the door to his colonial house but he felt his body sink into the hard dark brown wood of the porch chair. Reed sat in it, his weight triggering its swinging motion. He let the porch bench swing him back and forth. Back to being the big brother to two kids who were happy and stable. Forth into being a third parent to siblings who were two hurricanes spinning so fast and so dangerously they threatened to destroy others, then themselves. Reed let his blue eyes stare out ahead as far as they would allow.

There were stars above him, several of them. The clouds seemed to not want to show up this time, giving room to clarity. The sky was as blue as the dark storm that seemed to churn in his mother's eyes even though her exterior was cool, calm and contained. He had learned very quickly her eyes screamed when every other part of him stayed silent. Sometimes, it scared him. At one point, Reed walked into the house in a frenzy. She seemed possessed as she systemically broke framed photos, shattering them with a rage induced sweep of her arm. She walked over the china cabinet, throwing every glass and plate against the floor until the sound stopped. Her hands shook as Reed watched Mom stand in the middle of the broken glass like a zombie.

Like the flip of a switch, she met his eyes and blinked, realizing where she was and what she had done.

"Mom?"

"Hi, honey," she greeted and smiled. "How are my grandchildren?"

Reed hopped over and between broken pieces of glass. He let his eyes sweep over the sparkling glass all over the blue and white living room like snow.

"They're good."

"Good," she answered, playing with her hands with that smile still on her face. "That's great."

He saw his mother's exterior crack until pieces of it fell once by once. Tears formed in her eyes as she shook and slowly became with sobs bubbling to the surface. His mother was a naturally slender woman and always looked eternally ageless. Here, time slowly caught up with her. His mom seemed smaller under the weight of her pain.

"Jesus Christ, Mom…" Reed said more to himself than her. He let her walk into his arms and she still shook in them. Her sobbing was uncontrollable. Her words blended together so much Reed couldn't decipher right away. He remembered one thing she said repeatedly, though. "What did you do?"

"I've failed them! I've broken them! I didn't do enough for my babies! I've failed them!" she sobbed, and didn't stop so Reed held his mom in the middle of the broken glass.

—

The cool night air blew through as he rested his legs against the porch railing and crossed his legs at the ankles. He was wrapped up in his thoughts and how fast they reached, he didn't see Zoey step outside. He didn't see her pull her night robe closer to her body. Reed didn't feel her tiny hand on his shoulder until her voice found its way through the clumped together pieces of his head. He nearly jumped out of his skin until he relaxed and smiled, placing his hand on top of hers.

"Jumpy much, babe?" Zoey asked with a raised brow, as she walked around the bench. She sat down on the bench and kissed him. Reed felt this was good. His wife was his high school sweetheart and was comfortable with her. The scent of her skin wafted around him as she pressed soft yet teasing kisses to his neck. Reed let his eyes close and he felt her lips move from his throat to a spot his ear. She whispered in his ear, soft and seductive and he could feel his penis throb against the friction of his jeans. "Husband, you've left me all alone and lonely. No, two children do not count as company."

"You are not playing fair, Wife," Reed replied, pressing a kiss to her mouth that had a moan escape it. He pulled away, fingering her hair and bringing his hand to her smooth neck, her chest, her breasts made larger post-pregnancy. Reed saw her nipples harden through the black satin of her night robe. In one sweeping motion, Reed pulled him into his lap and Zoey squealed and cursed light-heartedly. "Remember how we celebrated senior prom?"

"Mhm. I gave you the best head of your life if I remember correctly, Hellstrom."

Reed's fingers twisted around the knot tied in a bow.

"What do you say we re-create it, Marshall?"

Zoey smirked and kissed him again, his face between her hands.

"That's Dr. Hellstrom to you," she shot back, breathless. "Alice and Holden are asleep, and I have better ways to make up for my unneeded alone time."

Reed stared at her through lust-filled eyes, picked her up and opened the front door. He carried her tiny form through it. He tried to navigate the long, winding staircase willing himself to get her up there to their master bedroom. His will had been stronger but the almost painful ache and the desire for his wife had won. For one night, Reed would have sex on the staircase, insert himself between her legs into the vagina wet for him. Just him. Only him. It would be only his name on her lips.

"Does anyone fuck you like I do?" Reed asked, in between thrusts as Zoey wrapped her legs around him and arched her back. "Hmmm?"

"No. No one… No," she answered, breaking the one syllable word. Zoey smiled wickedly and dug her nails into the muscular surface of his back, it drew blood. He felt the fresh scratches screaming hot on his skin and the pain only made him want more. "Only you, Reed. Just…you."

He felt her tighten around against him. He could feel on the brink, near the edge, almost at the end of a song without the perfect bridge or a chorus that was memorable for the end of all time. Zoey shuddered under him and she let out a cry he could feel come from the deepest part of her. Reed would brand himself into her body. Reed would make sure she felt every part of him in her heart and the one to break her soul roughly only to put the pieces together lovingly.

Zoey stifled another cry. "Reed, I'm…almost…"

"No!" he growled, taking her hands firmly on his ass and holding them above her head. She knew what it meant and interlocked their fingers so tightly, they shared a mutual ache in their hands. It didn't compare to the beautiful ache that merged Reed with his wife. "Not yet, baby. Not yet…"

He felt himself building to his own climax. He was hitting his own crescendo. Reed looked her as locked her green eyes with his blue ones. They saw each other as they were in the past as high school kids full of possibilities. Reed and Zoey saw each other as they were now. She was his. She was his blonde goddess of a muse and at her mercy. Finally, finally, Reed felt Zoey break and shudder under him letting go. She begged him, branded I love yous into his skin with her hands and etched the words _you're mine_ with her mouth when he had release and tasted him after skillfully stroking and teasing him with it.

Finally, Reed came into her at the height of his orgasm. He released his warmth into her and she moaned again in pleasure. "Mmm, yes," she hummed, raising her hips to welcome his load and accept the innermost parts of him. "Yes…give me all of you…"

The staircase's surface had been rough and uneven but softened by the carpet. It was made sweeter by the purest kind of love and made sinful by the strongest kind of lust. Zoey collapsed onto him as Reed saw the stars in his eyes goes from a blinding light, to comfortably dim. Reed kissed her golden hair and she climbed on top of him. A gleam danced in her eyes as she straddled him and kissed him, resting her forehead against his. The palms of her tiny hands carried fire that burned his shoulders.

"Who's your muse?"

Reed brought a hand to her face, feeling the softness of her skin.

"You…" he replied, almost mesmerized by her. "Just you."

Zoey ran her hands through his dark hair and pulled it back a little painfully. He felt her lips against his throat. She pressed slow kisses yet they were ones of hunger. Zoey kissed his neck, sucking and biting hard enough to mark him. Reed could feel the mark of a hickey forming underneath the surface until it broke through, manifesting in a dark purple mark. She smirked against it as her fingers fluttered over the tip of his newly hardened penis and brought her hand down to stroke its shaft.

Reed groaned at the new chill of pleasure that coursed through him and Zoey slowly pumped him. She looked into his eyes and in her, he saw his partner. His other half. Reed saw the woman who sparked his sweetest daydreams and brought his darkest fantasies to life because they were also hers. They weren't parents of the two children sleeping peacefully upstairs. Reed wasn't anyone's son, a musician, or anyone's older brother. Reed was in his own playground with his wife, dancing and twisting in the dark and sexual expanse with him.

Zoey threw him upwards into the sky forcing his eyes wide against the sun's rays. Then she ripped the bottom in half with her hands and dropped him into a comfortable abyss. Up and down he went on a carousel. Reed never, ever wanted to let go of it.

"Who inspires you?" she asked him, huskily. She picked up her tempo and Reed ground out a shattered string of curses. Her hands were masterful, skilled. She knew if how the human body worked and how to manipulate his to her pleasure. He loved it more when she inflicted pain on him too. "Yes, babe. I will fuck you. Soon. Very soon. I said," she asked him, a dark spark behind her eyes. It almost made her a strange exotic creature that was powerful yet soft and beautiful, "who inspires you? Who is your muse?"

"You..." Reed choked out, with another curse escaping him. "Zoey. Always."

"Good," she replied, satisfied. Reed felt her push him on his back. She let go, kissing his chest. When she knew he would split apart for the second time that night, Zoey shushed him by pressing another soft kiss to his abdomen. She touched him as though he were something sacred, a temple for her to corrupt. _Corrupt me. Corrupt all of me._ "Shh… hold on just a bit longer. Shhh… I'll make you all better."

Reed could himself clenching again as she took him in her mouth. There was a warm familiarity that surged him lightning quick. His hand found her head and had a feeling of roughness that contrasted her soft hair. Yet her licked and sucked him. Her mouth ran up and down in perfect rhythm. Reed let out a guttural cry as more of his cum entered Zoey's mouth. She received it, heard it in her swallowing and gulping until his member became limp and hung free. Zoey sighed, content and wiped her mouth with a smile of satisfaction.

"God, I love you," Reed panted, as she smiled and wiped her mouth. "So much."

Zoey smiled back, breathing rapidly and racing heart against him.

"I love you, Reed. Every past of you," she whispered as he captured her lips in a kiss. She tasted sweet like the apple tasted under secrecy in the garden of Eden, pushed by his own impulses. She tasted of home and sanity as they created a perfect storm of insanity.

* * *

 **bella fisher**

They said life began and ended in the shape of a perfect circle. Yet the time of birth and time of death were etched on a hard surface, held together by a line. A small line glued time together. What if that little line came apart and snapped in half. It could have come apart because of sickness, accidents and sometimes, through willful, purposeful actions. Breath left and came back into the body but what if that breath stopped because something in the body went wrong or broke down altogether? Bella was always told she was a curious person—always asking questions and wanting to know everything and anything remotely fascinating. The human body fascinated her. The body – or rather, the inside of it – enthralling. The jugular vein nestled in the neck carrying blood from the head and face. It could make a person blush hot or pale and be cool. Ah, the carotid artery. This was the crown jewel, the main pathway that carried blood through little parts of the body.

The lungs reminded Bella of two helium balloons that raised themselves up into the sky above the clouds and into the stars. What would happen if those balloons popped? Adrenaline pumped through her, triggering a racing heart. Of course, the heart was the control center. Without it, death would appear as a parent would appear to lull their child to sleep. If Bella could get the perfect angle under the breastbone, she would be successful in her experiment to reach it and stop it. Bella always did find it satisfying to see the light behind their eyes slowly vanish until there was nothing left and it made her giddy.

A microscopic part of her searched for guilt or remorse. Bella tried to uncover her conscience and moral reasoning and realized the search was unsuccessful. Because that search resulted in failure, she dared not try it again. She had a small form, petite and brunette like her mother. They always praised her sweet disposition and quick wit. Yet Fisher blood ran through her veins. She was aware of the darkness that tainted it and bled over into the Baldwin one that ran parallel to her. She was the niece and cousin of two lawyers who themselves, had remnants of shadows but let go of them. She was the granddaughter of a woman who clawed her way upwards with her own brand of functional insanity. She was the daughter of a man who was good – worked on the side of right – yet even now, stayed comfortable being on the edge every so often. She was also the daughter of a woman who stared back at her and died under a snowfall of pills.

Bella mused that perhaps, something big and monstrous had found safety in something so small. Bella was going to give it shelter, house it, and keep it safe and buried safe inside of her. She had a boyfriend in Connor Newman who she did love and yet, his little brother, Christian stayed on the fringes. She didn't know how she saw him and how it was that he was able to find her. Bella didn't know for the life of her how Connor could love her so intensely and how Christian stayed back yet penetrated through her with a glance, a look, a brush of the hand.

She shook her head renewing her focus. It stretched beyond the biology paper in front of her. Why write a paper about the four humours when she could experience them up close? Why write about the importance of oxygenated blood when she could see how bright red it was in technicolour? Uncle Mikey's retirement party was later tonight and Dad wouldn't be back until later. Bella had to work fast yet planning quickly to every last detail. She looked around her room, decorated in soft pastels of aquamarine, ivory and seafoam green. She jumped on her bed, and removed a large rectangular painting which revealed a secret safe. Bella's eyebrows knitted together in concentration as she twisted the numbers open. Within that safe, Bella twisted her wrist to another embedded compartment. She breathed a sigh of relief and smiled when she pulled up the large silver box.

Bella removed her bobby pin from her hair allowing one brown curl to fall free even though her hair stayed in its bun. She jiggled it until the lock opened. She retrieved the object of her search and relished in the cool metal. She ran her finger against the serrated edges, wincing when she felt the sharpness of being cut. A thin line of blood slowly surfaced and Bella put her finger in her mouth to stop it.

Yes, she could make this work.

"Perfect," Bella grinned, as the cut on her index finger bled a second time.

—

Bella was a collector. She collected sands from different beaches. Gloria was also happy to bring them by for her. Bella also collected sea shells that differed in size, colour, and texture. That's how she saw every animal before and every person after. Beginnings were different and their ends were different. Some of them were quick to go. Others held on to that light until it slipped away and Bella pushed them into the dark. Experiment complete.

She pulled on a black sweater, her favourite black skinny low rise jeans and tugged a cute black beanie over her head. Bella pulled her black boots onto her bare feet and surveyed her tool of choice before she stowed it away. It wasn't big or that long but if she was precise, she would be successful. That was the most important thing here. She pulled on black leather gloves. Bella had to handle her dad and then she could go. She really did love him, truly and completely but Bella had to handle him so he didn't distract her.

Bella swiped through her contacts until she found him, and dialed him with a tap of her gloved finger. It rang three times before he answered, a steady stream of typing sounds as background noise.

"Hey, Sweets."

"Dad, hey!" Bella answered. "Can I meet you at Uncle Mikey's party? This bio paper is killing me and I have to do additional research on it."

Bella could hear her dad sigh, and groan. "I need you with me so I can have some of my sanity left."

"At some point, you have to stop using me as a buffer to deal with Gloria," Bella deadpanned while finding the right degree comfort from the knife. "I think it would be bordering on child endangerment if you let me ride with Gloria."

"Fen will do it."

"So, I can be the awkward third person in the backseat with Fen and Summer? No."

"Michael and Lauren."

"No," Bella shook her head. "I love them but again, third wheel situation."

"Who's going to take you, then?"

"Connor. You know, six foot one. Dark hair. Brown eyes. My boyfriend."

"He's not good enough for you," Dad grumbled. Bella knew it was more than about Connor. It was about his father and his part in the death of a sister she had lost before she existed. It was about the pain Dad felt although all these years. It was a dull ache now. It was about the grief that killed her mother's soul before her body caught up. Her dad was also changed and seemed haunted by some ghost of her mother. It was as if all these years, he couldn't let go of her and therefore, Bella felt haunted herself.

The death of the mother triggered murderous sadism in the daughter, Bella thought amused.

"You don't think anyone is good enough for me," Bella retorted, with a light smile. She glanced out her window. The clear blue sky was shifting into the nature-induced rainbow of a sunset. Bella could hear the distant bubbling of the lake at the bottom of the steep cliff. "I have to go get this research done and I'll meet you there."

"Okay, fine. Be careful, Bella."

"I'll be careful, Dad, I always am," she promised, letting anticipation run wild and free. She smirked, glancing out of her window. What could go wrong? She returned the wall above her bed to normalcy again. She made her room the epitome of innocence again before she left.

—

There was an advantage to being small. No one saw her coming, and those who did, thought of her as being sweet and harmless. Perception was delightfully weird that way. Bella quickly and effortlessly slipped out of her bedroom window like a shadow and disappeared. She would only re-appear as someone's daydream when it was an incoming nightmare. Bella walked slowly through the woods a half an hour's walk from her house before going onto a street lit by street lamps. She strolled calmly and smiled at people who said hello to her, politely replying. Bella felt the imprint of a key in her pocket, the feel of the cool silver on her hip covered up by her loose sweater. Turning a secluded corner, Bella walked a little further until she saw it and relief bloomed in her stomach. Yes, it was still abandoned yet still standing.

It was a little abandoned house, condemned by the city because it served as the local murder house where people had been bound, tortured there. At least, that's what the legend said. It was condemned, in truth, so the city could make it open space and build high rise condos in its place. With both Newman Enterprises and Jabot Cosmetics towering over the rest of the mere mortals, Bella didn't see the need.

It would come down soon. For a structure that was doomed to be demolished, it was decently sound. The boards of the back porch creaked under her weight but just as she had at her house, Bella slipped into the window. It only amazed her how semi immaculate this place was but it was what lay beneath that made Bella adore this place. Bella's dark eyes darted around the top floor. She walked over careful of the sound her heels made when in contact with the floor. She slipped the key she had retrieved from her pocket and made sure, it nestled in the deep pockets of her jeans. A lone flickering light bulb lit the stairs for her although the path stayed engraved in her mind. Bella could have navigated this in complete darkness if she wanted.

When she got to the bottom stair, Bella smiled. It was exactly as she left it.

The blonde girl who had been declared missing, the center of tear-filled pleas from family members, and the subject of many candlelit vigils, sat weakly and chained by one foot to the wall. The chain was short enough to yank her back but long enough to give her hope of escaping. Poor thing. The girl's head lolled forward as she fell into sleep triggered by weakness, hunger, and fear. Bella stared at her fragile form and frowned at how beautiful she was in those MISSING PERSON posters plastered around town. She knew because Bella helped put a few of them up herself.

Bella kicked her forcefully awake and Bree Sanders' head snapped up. Her hazel eyes were wide and darting around until they landed on Bella. They searched her face. Bree gasped and scurried close to the wall.

"Hi. Sorry for the accommodations. Aren't you glad I didn't let you die from starvation?" Bella asked shrugged, burying her leather gloved hands in her pockets. "Would have defeated the whole purpose."

"No, no…you're back! Damnit, you came back!" Bree cried, sobbing. "Bella, please. What have I ever done to you? I don't even know you that well! Why me? Why did you choose _me_?"

Bella grew quiet, pondering this question. It was true that while she was in the same year as Bree, they weren't friends. They weren't even acquaintances but Bella did like her. They were two people in the same program at GCU floating in the same friendship and study group circles. On occasion, they bumped into each other and traded polite hellos. There was that one time, Bree was kind enough to loan her a pencil when she had left her pencil case in her car. Why? The truth was that Bree was chosen to be her next biology experiment at random. The TA had unknowingly helped her. Lanie had written their names on pieces of paper to schedule presentation dates just to demonstrate what would be the crux of their research paper. Random draws were always a completely fair and democratic process, Bella remembered hearing. Lanie shook up the names in her fedora and Bree's name had appeared first.

Bella listened with rapt attention as Bree discussed the logic behind her paper – how stem cells could one day be harvested to repair the lungs of asthmatic patients. Or, rather the possibility of it. _Oh,_ Bella thought although it was seen outwardly as interest. _Bree has asthma._

" _I_ didn't choose you," Bella answered, finally, retrieving her knife with the jagged edges. A slow smile grew on her features. "Lanie did."

"What are you talking—" Bree started to say, and then realized with horror. "The random draw for the presentation… oh my God. You're sick! Jesus, Bella…you're legitimately crazy! That's why you targeted me? Because of a _fucking_ draw?"

"I'm not insane," Bella said, sweetly. "Let's call it…curiosity."

Bree started to speak again and dissolved into sobs again.

"Bella, please. Let me…go. I swear, I won't tell anyone."

A laugh escaped Bella's lips, and she bent down to get to her level. Cold brown eyes met wide, fearful hazel ones. Yes, the fear was good. Rapid breathing, heart beating faster and stronger. "You know my father, Kevin Fisher? My uncle and cousins are attorneys. Fenmore and Michael Baldwin."

She roughly grabbed Bree who cried out at the sheer force of landing painfully on her back. Bella held her in place by straddling her. Bella was unusually strong for someone so small. Must have got it from Mom, she purposed. "They are involved in all facets of the criminal system, hun. So, believe me when I say I think it's all bullshit. Of course, you'll tell. It's human to push buried things to the surface and release it. After all the trouble I had to go through to get you here…"

"You lured me," Bree paused to cough, "here!"

Bella raised an eyebrow, and snorted, "Poor thing. Nobody told you about Stranger Danger," she clicked her tongue in disdain and shook her head. "They said you were too trusting. Look at where that trust has landed you, Bree."

"You're a damn sociopath!" Bree hissed, narrowing her eyes. "You're not human!"

Bella immediately punched her in the face, making her head snap to the side.

Bree screamed, fruitlessly and started to grab at her, only catching air. Bella wasn't going to let Bree scratch her so there could be DNA evidence under her dirty fingernails. She squirmed and kicked. She aimed to scratch Bella's face to no avail. Bella had to admire that Bree would fight for her life. The other two gave up so easily. Nadia Wilder was a pretty redhead that Bella had given a crimson necklace as the blade tore her neck open, carotid artery pushing more blood out with her slowing heartbeat. Nadia's neck bled profusely and stained her white blouse. She grew pale from the rapid loss of blood and blood pressure decrease. She fell to the ground like a wilting flower and went into epileptic seizures. She writhed around on the dirt floor, body contorting rigidly as her eyes rolled into the back of her head. White foam bubbled up from her mouth and mixed with the blood. Bella watched, not sure where the red hair and the blood came apart. When the show was over, Bella stepped over her to avoid the blood and went home. Bella showered and went to have Chinese takeout with the family at Uncle Mikey and Aunt Lauren's house.

Janice MacFarlane had been beaten into a bloody mess with a heavy branch until Bella broke it, her own adrenaline vibrating through her veins and squeezing her head. That enraged her. Her pancreas was working too hard for her to concentrate on the task at hand. One shuddering gasp escaped her as Janice's beautiful mocha dark skin was streaked with her own blood. Janice's eyes were fixed on her, begging, pleading. She tried to form coherent words but the blood gurgling in her lungs made it difficult, impossible. Bella sighed rolling her eyes and picked the splintered half of the bloody stick.

 _I guess I'm going to have to put you out of misery,_ Bella said with a shrug. _Least I can do, I suppose._

Bella yelled as she put all her strength into her final swing. The force cracked more bones in Janice's face and disfigured her further. Bella threw the stick away as Janice's form grew still and limp. She grunted with exertion as rolled Janice's body to the edge of the cliff and let gravity to the rest of the work. Bella sighed in a cleansing exhale and rested her hand against the trunk of a tree to catch her breath.

"No!" Bree screamed, as a last ditched attempt for rescue. "Somebody help me! Help me! God, someone…please," she coughed again and wheezed. "Please…help…"

Bella smiled as Bree's breathing grew rapid as she trailed off, short and laboured. Hazel eyes widened at the realization of what was happening. An asthma attack. Bree moved around frantically under her as Bella watched the other girl try to breathe. Like Janice, Bree tried to verbalize words but sounded like a fish struggling to breathe on land.

"Your life," Bella whispered, softly and touched the length of Bree's throat. A hummingbird flapped its wings underneath the smoothness, "is literally in my hands and I'm going to squeeze it out of you."

—

Bella created a vice with both of her hands against Bree's throat and squeezed. She could feel her own head pounding with the increasing force she exerted on Bree's neck. Bella was in her own kind of bliss, an ecstasy that made her head swim. Third time was the charm, they said. Good things happened in threes, they also said. Colours swirled around her – some she recognized and others strange and foreign – and melted. White for the pills that fell around her mother like morbid confetti. Black for Bella's outside and the disintegration of her insides despite her angel-faced exterior. Blue for the colour that Bree's skin was morphing into. It was more concentrated around her lips as if death had been contouring, highlighting and giving her lip colour to look beautiful. _You are beautiful. You are. You're beautiful when you die._

Bree's eyes started to close.

"No!" Bella screamed, going into an unnaturally high pitch as Bree's kicking slowed down and she could almost feel the windpipe constricting under her palms. She stared into the two pools of hazel on the brink of losing its glimmer and dimming into nothingness. Bella would not be deprived of that pivotal moment. She had to see it and be satisfied. She had to blow out the candles of Bree Sanders' life. "Look at me while you're dying, bitch. I want to _see_ you. Look at me, damnit!"

The eyes opened again, whether voluntary or involuntary she wasn't sure, nor she did care. Bree still held on and the fingers of rage and impatience reached and squeezed Bella's lungs. She removed one hand from Bree's throat and smoothly retrieved the knife with its jagged edges. _Aim for the breastbone and push up. Aim for the breast bone and push upwards._ So, she did. Bella gripped the smooth black hilt and on her next inhale, she drove the blade in, blood started to bloom and silver became dark red. Bree made a sound deep from her chest and the muscles in her body tensed. Bella, careful not to let any blood spill and with the fluid movement of surgeon, slowly pushed upwards as far as it would go until silver disappeared and all that was left was the hilt. Bella twisted the hilt around hearing the jagged edges cut through flesh and snap bone, searching for it. Bella pushed the hilt up at a slight angle until she finally found it. Her heart. That damn beating heart. That fucking heart stupid enough to lend her one sharp object only to die by another. Just because she could, Bella pulled the knife out with a little less finesse and needed a grand finale. Something to wrap her successful experiment up. Bella scanned the left upper part of Bree's chest with a careful eye. She had stabbed it with the tip and could be enough to be fatal. She was pretty she had hit a lung along the way. Bella didn't want _could bes_. She wanted scientific fact. Bella grabbed the hilt with two hands, raising the knife slightly above her head and drove straight down to the center. There was a soft, but high-pitched grunt. It could have been Bree from the direct impact of the blade slicing through the muscle tissue, to the atrium of her heart, the rough edges cutting the ventricles and the arteries ripped like tightly stretched rubber bands. Bella pressed down, using gravity as an aid until like the previous stab wounds, only the black hilt remained. It could have been from Bella due to the strength had to put in the final stab and the effort behind it.

Bree's body started jerking, skin going from deoxygenated blue to deathly white. She jerked once more forcefully, her chest rising from the impact before it went like a deflated balloon. It was as if Bree in her own way, realized Bella had stabbed her body and her soul had to go because it had no other choice. It melted between Bella's fingers and bled on the blade of her favourite knife. Bree was taking her last breaths, eyes wide until truly, the light behind Bree Sanders' eyes faded into oblivion and Bella slid off the body of her third kill. Blood slowly rise as it trickled up Bree's mouth and overflowed onto the basement floor. Bella moved to avoid it.

Bella pulled the blade out of the body as gently she could to minimize the blood dripping. She stood, shaking hand gripping the hilt. Her hands did not tremble from fear or the idea of being caught. Rather, they shook from the absence of remorse and the thrill of the whole encounter. Calming herself, she still gripped the hilt. With a white handkerchief she had her placed in her bra, Bella wiped the blood off the blade making it shine silver again. She smiled, shoving the white material back in. The blood was still fresh but cool against the softness of left breast over her heart. She would keep it in the double layer safe nestled away or she would simply burn it. Bella sighed, and crouched against the wall and glanced at Bree's body, the empty eyes staring at her.

"Oh, don't look at me that way. Blame that underpaid idiotic TA for damning you," she said, with a frown. Bella closed her eyes, remembering the retirement party for her uncle. Uncle Mikey was retiring from practicing law and passing the practice over to Fen. Right. There was that. It was a swimming picture of friendly, familial faces. The noise in Bella's head was all static. "I'm going to this family party tonight to be the sweet, supportive niece," she sighed, shaking her head. "Two brothers worship at my feet. What's a girl to do? Any suggestions, Bree?"

There was silence and Bella smiled, knowingly. Of course, there was going to be silence. Dead men couldn't tell tales and dead young men couldn't speak either.

"If it's any consolation, I'd totally fuck your dad," Bella whispered, as if sharing a secret. She'd let this one out to live and breathe. It wasn't going to go anywhere. Bree wasn't going to speak now or ever. "Maybe, just maybe I already have."

—

A cellphone lit itself up under the hardcover of a biology anthology. It buzzed, rang and moved with the strength of the vibration. Finally, it stopped and went dim again. There was a sharp three toned sound, signifying a new text message. Multiple tones rang out.

 **Connor  
** _30 minutes ago_ **  
**Hey beautiful.

 **Connor  
** _28 minutes ago  
_ I'm thinking of you, babe.

 **Connor  
** _26 minutes ago_  
I'm bringing you 12 roses later tonight. 12. One year of us. I love that number, don't you? 12. It's a good solid number. Like 16.

 **Connor  
** _24 minutes ago  
_ I love you.

 **Aunt Lauren  
** _21 minutes ago_  
I may have a dress for you. Call me, sweetheart. xo.

Bella's phone rang on her desk again as she ran through the cover of night all the way home. The handkerchief bearing the stain of Bella's actions stayed with her. The alert went off like a bomb. It was as if the walls of the soft pastel coloured bedroom began to bleed.

 **Christian**  
 _14 minutes ago_  
Out damned spot.

 **Christian  
** _13 minutes ago_  
Thrice, Bella. THRICE.

* * *

 **connor newman**

He washed his body four times after he came home to an empty apartment although he shared it with his younger brother. Christian had gone walking tonight like he always did every night no matter the conditions. If he divided the number four against itself, that was one wash for both arms and both legs. He had to escort Bella to her uncle's party tonight even though her dad hated him. Connor loved enough to tolerate it. He loved her enough for anything.

He counted his toes from one to ten and scrubbed his feet – the heels, in between the toes, the bottom of the feet. He counted his hands with fingers and scrubbed them. Connor was used to the rough feel of the sponge against his skin. The roughness was good. The roughness was an asset. The roughness of the sponge meant he was getting clean. The dirt swirled away in a soapy whirlpool. Dirt was bad. Dirt didn't allow things to be in order. Connor let the shower water hit his skin. When he closed his eyes and allowed the soap to be rinsed from his body, he counted the number of times he felt the little stream of water shoot at him like arctic bullets. He counted one, two, four, eight, twelve, fifteen –

Wait, that wasn't right. The number couldn't be divided between two evenly. Fifteen divided by two equaled seven and a half. Seven point five could not be divided by two either. That equals three point two five. No, that wasn't correct. Connor furrowed a brow, streams of water rushing at him again. He could the imperfection burrow under his skin, crawl like a long insect with an infinite of legs. No, no, no.

"I have to count again," Connor muttered to himself, biting the fleshy inside of his cheek to keep from grinding his teeth. "C'mon. Count them again, Newman."

The shower wasn't defective. He rested a shaking hand against the glass door and steadied his breathing. With every inhale, he made sure that was one exhale to match it. For everything, there was an even complete match. He concentrated on the pinpricks of water again and forced his brain to count again.

"One. Two… Four… Eight… Ten…" Connor paused, concentrating again and counting again. "Twelve…. Fifteen… Seventeen."

Seventeen. Fucking seventeen. The bugs of imperfection multiplied further and Connor felt three of them. If they were like earthworms, they would split themselves into one and a half copies of itself. The fluttering little legs that tickled uncomfortably became feet with gnarled toes and claws for nails that dug into his muscles. The pain built up and when Connor could not deal with it anymore, when he could not get perfect numerical harmony, he screamed and punched the glass, He breathed in and out, heaving as the anger was warm instead of searing hot. The glass rattled four times against the force of his fist and all was right again. Four. He liked that number.

Four. Four. The number of syllables in Bella's name. _Bella Fisher_. Four. The number of syllables in his name. _Connor Newman_. Four divided by two. Two. The two of them. Connor and Bella. Two divided by two equaled one. One relationship. His relationship with Bella meant he loved her and she him.

Connor forced himself not to divide two against itself.

One meant something was alone, all by itself. One meant loneliness.

The number one meant that if he was alone, he had failed. Failure was not perfect. If Connor was alone and his nearly perfect GPA wasn't morphed into that whole four point oh, then he had fallen short and made himself half of a person. Connor would not allow that so he ran a wet hand through his wet dark hair once more, turned off the water in two turns of the tap. Connor smiled as the stream wafted into the bathroom. He felt much better.

—

Connor wrapped his towel around him and walked into his bedroom, decorated in polar colours. Black and white. They were just colours that became a part of the other. He pulled the smaller towel from his neck as it rested on both shoulders. He rubbed the towel over his hair as it stuck up in different directions. He caught a glance of his own reflection and Connor frowned. He did the same rubbing motion with the towel for the fourth time. Still, his hair did not result in being oriented towards being in one direction.

His hands hadn't done this. Connor sitting on his bed to breathe and settle his nerves. Christian wasn't here to annoy him with the unspoken charm he oozed when with Bella. Bella was _his_ girlfriend. He was the one with the swag. Connor was the one who had charm brighter than Christian's. Frankly, he was a better person than his brother and everyone knew it. Christian wasn't there to stretch his nerves when he smiled a smile that told him their parents favoured him more. Christian wasn't there to taunt him with backhanded compliments disguised as an insult and he certainly wasn't there to irritate him with the quiet calm that almost made him detached. Connor was attached. He was aware. His head didn't feel like cotton and rip itself off his shoulders, making it float aimlessly and unsteady.

Connor saw her. Bella. Connor saw her two perfect brown eyes, saw her one cute button nose. She appeared to him naked. Her body was small but perfectly proportional and symmetric. Two round breasts Connor wanted to touch and feel its pink nipples harden and get erect in his mouth. Two lips on her face that were his to kiss and hers to press against his skin. Two arms that let themselves fall around his neck naturally as she pressed her body to him. Two shoulders were beautiful soft shoulders. Two little feet with ten toes painted in one uniform. Two legs that were average – not long at all – but perfect as they intertwined with his before and after sex. Between them, her vagina was nestled there, quivering and dripping its sweet juices in anticipation of him. Only him. Its two lips were doors that opened and revealed to him one perfect pink clitoris for him. It was his to play with. It was his so that Connor feel the erect smooth surface of the organ on his tongue. Her perfect rosy clit was his to manipulate until Bella pushed his name past the pearly gates of her white teeth and sent it to the angels above.

Connor wrapped a finger around one of her soft curls as she held his face between her soft palms. She smiled at him and seemed to glow.

"There's no one but us, Connor," she whispered. "No one. Just two. Just the two of us."

Connor smiled back. "I like the number two like I love you."

Bella dropped her gaze, long dark eyelashes seeming to rest on her cheeks. Slender fingers dragged themselves along his abdomen and along his hips. She never looked back up but her fingers continued to work as she gently removed his towel. "I love you, too. I love you, always. Let me show you."

"Okay," he said, and hands of ice placed them into his shoulders and legs of silk straddled him. Fingers with magic embedded in them danced around the tip of his penis before dragging themselves along the shaft. Up and down they went. Up and down magic seeped into him and ran through him and electrified every nerve in his body, nearly stretching them. "Bella…"

"I love you," Bella whispered, over and again, finally all five fingers wrapped around his cock. She never broke his gaze as she kissed his neck and brought her mouth to his ear in a husky whisper. "Lie down and I'll find the magic number."

Connor allowed himself to fall into his bed. He counted in his head as Bella put his penis in her grasp and pumped painfully slow. It was a good kind of pain. It was a pain that intensified as Bella pumped aside and his brain sped up to be in tandem with her. Ten…eleven…twelve.

He grunted as he felt the warmth of her mouth, her tongue swirling the head. He squeezed his eyes shut as he felt himself grow erect. He wrapped his hand in more of her brown hair and pushed her head deeper into his crotch. The motion got quicker.

Twenty-six…twenty-seven…twenty-nine.

Connor felt his chest tighten, his lungs about to burn as Bella drained him of any sense of time, sense of direction. He couldn't see her but could touch her. He couldn't taste her because she could taste all of him. The veins expanded in his cock with the sensation of the pressure cooker waited to burst until he had nothing left. Bella was killing him. She was draining him. Connor was going to die, and he would let himself focus on the numbers and feel of her before he died.

"Thirty, thirty-one…thirty-two… Thirty-eight…" Connor bucked his hips, fireworks in his abdomen as he could feel himself started to mathematically divide. No, no, not yet. No, he wouldn't. 38 couldn't be divided in a way that was comprehended. 38 divided by 2 equaled 19. 19 divided 2 equaled 9.5. 9.5 divided by - no, no, no, no. Bella had to stay and find his magic number. He couldn't let her leave without numerical nirvana. "Forty… Forty-one, forty-five…fifty…"

Connor felt the beads of sweat on his forehead and the motion reached a quicker speed although it stayed perfectly steady. He could feel himself throbbing under his grasp, under the crevices and recesses of Bella's mouth. Faster, faster, faster. He wanted to count faster, find the magic number in the frenzy.

"Fifty four…" Connor cursed, loudly. "…fifty-five…fifty-nine."

 _Almost there, babe. Almost, babe_ , Connor could hear Bella's soothing timbre somewhere in purgatory. _Find the magic number_.

"Sixty… sixty-one… sixty-two…sixty-four…"

Connor orgasmed, a wave of mathematical equations running through his body. They burst out of him when he ejaculated. He grunted through his teeth, breath stopped his throat as the number 64 split in half under his eyelids.

32.

16.

8.

4.

"Four divided by two…" he panted, drenched in sweat. "…is two."

2.

Connor shook again, as the remnants of his orgasm were still felt. He exhaled and let his eyes close as he felt Bella's magic fingers in his hair.

"I told you," Bella purred, fingers still making soft stroking motions in his dark hair. "I told you. Two. It's always two. You won't let anyone divide the number further, will you?"

"No. Never," Connor answered, opening his eyes and looking upward to meet her face. There was something different in her eyes, something dark and almost sinister there. The warmth was gone. Brown had changed to two bottomless dark abysses in her face. Still, she bewitched him. He'd do anything for her. Connor would do everything for her. He touched her face and she placed her hand on top of his with a serene smile. The nails painted a soft shade of peach became long, sharp claws. "I won't let the magic number divide."

"Good, Connor. Very good."

"I won't let Christian divide the magic number."


	3. Prologue: Part III

**Testosterone Boys & Harlequin Girls  
show:** Young and the Restless  
 **notes:** I finally figured out what the storyline for each people would before I intertwine them together and weave them in and out of each other. Everything is interconnected even though it doesn't seem like it at the moment. Like the last time, it still kind of dark. The whole nature of the story is dark. There are some uncomfortable themes in here, so if something does make you feel that way or trigger you, please exercise common sense and stop reading. I only write this for imagination and not to risk anybody's emotional health. Okay. Here's Part 3. Part 4 is the LAST part of the prologue before the actual story kicks off. I'm sorry for the length. There was just a lot of ground to cover. This is my longest part of the whole thing. There is a part 4 of the prologue and then the REAL story kicks off. I'm always done mapping everything.  
 **disclaimer** : nope, nope, and again, Forgive any typos.

 **Background Music** :  
 _Control_ by Halsey (Faith)  
 _Polarize_ by Twenty One Pilots, _My Demons_ by Starset,  & _Doubt_ by Twenty One Pilots (Charlie)  
 _Devil In Me_ by Halsey (Lucy)  
 _Now or Never_ by Halsey (Mattie)

* * *

 **PROLOGUE  
PART III**

* * *

 **faith newman**

"Who is your favourite Newman?"

If Faith Newman was posed the above question, she would ponder it although the answer was bright as the neon lights on places in the seedy underbelly of New York. Her aunt Victoria was the answer. Her aunt was beautiful, and striking – a living, breathing porcelain doll with an icy exterior but a warm inside complete with a heart bigger than her body. When she was a child, Faith used to stare at her aunt and think her eyes were so pretty and expressive. As an adult, Faith now knew how why her aunt's blue eyes impacted her so much. Aunt Victoria had a paradoxical quality about her. Those blue eyes were icy, cold as a polar vortex in Genoa City. On the other end, Aunt Victoria's eyes reminded her of a cloudless blue sky with the sun shining on people so warmly, it felt soothing to the soul. There was a balance about her aunt and Faith was envious. She didn't have balance. She didn't have a healthy half of light and darkness. Faith didn't understand that ruthlessness sometimes needed to be tempered with compassion. Rather, Faith chose one extreme and dug her heels into it.

Faith chose darkness because light blinded her. She chose ruthlessness over compassion because ruthlessness kept her mind from unravelling any more than it was. She sunk her claws into the effects of her inherited bipolar disorder. Sometimes, she felt as though it burrowed and landed in her bloodstream. It sunk into the delicate blue pathways under her light skin and turned them black. But it felt like warm sunshine that couldn't be blocked by the lithium clouds. Faith sipped her champagne from the rooftop of her multi-million dollar Manhattan penthouse apartment. She tapped a black nail repeatedly quickly. The sound was delicate but sharp but it felt like a death toll that filled the room. Faith Newman's apartment was decorated in blacks, pearl white and gold. A grand multi-tiered chandelier constructed of authentic Swarovski crystals and black onyx was fixed to the ceiling. The New York skyline carried a noticeable contrast that permeated every facet of it right down to the air. The skyline burst alive with colour and movement. With the rising sun, the yellow taxis bustled happily along its streets and roads. Central Park was seen in vivid in technicolour as happy couples walked through it with sweet nothings between them. Dogs barked and ran with their owners. The air had a humming noise and cracked with the sense of purpose and hopeful people had for the day. At night, the city was illuminated and came alive with a buzz in that same air that called the creatures of the night, the depraved to the nights, sounds and the colours blurred together by chemical induced hazes. The green surface of the State of Liberty glowed, glass towers glinting with the stars and the light of the full moon.

Faith smirked, her sharp gaze looking forward and scanning the perimeter of her domain. She was known and more importantly, she was feared. This was her empire. Her hair was made gold with the light of her chandeliers and Faith could hear the heartbeats and breath of the monsters painted in art on her walls. Their frozen claws tore her apart and the still fangs embedded themselves in her neck, injecting her with a dark, acidic venom. She tipped the glass to tip the taste of last of her champagne on her tongue. Pink glossed lips slowly lost the smirk in it as she turned around to face the person standing across from her.

Faith ran a finger around the rim of the empty champagne flute before she screamed, throwing the glass against the nearest wall. The other person jumped and cowered as she stood on six inch heels. Long legs shook although she looked as they should in her tight black backless dress. Auburn hair was styled to perfection, makeup done flawlessly to keep the business thriving. Faith took a deep, cleansing breath but the anger only coiled itself tight like a boa constrictor. Blue eyes became sharp with a predatory undertone in them. Faith stuck her hands in the pockets of her white jumper, golden bracelets making noise the moment. She took careful steps toward the woman trembling more than already was. Her steps were measured, heels clicking slowly with every step. Faith circled around her like a hunter circling its prey.

When she came around to look into those brown doe eyes, Faith saw the fear and pleading in them she was afraid to verbalize.

Faith tapped an index finger on her light pink glossed lips in thought.

"Mercedes," she said, in a tone that was wrought with controlled rage barely kept at bay. "What the hell am I going to do with you? Oh. I know exactly what to do."

Dark red lips barely parted themselves before Faith let that anger squeeze her. She backhanded Mercedes across the face so hard, she fell to the ground with an audible thud. Mercedes gasped and shook holding her face. Brown eyes glittered with tears but were pushed back. Faith crouched down to Mercedes' level on her heels with ease and stared at her. The tanned cheek was a screaming red. She watched Mercedes swallow and those doe eyes reminded Faith of a deer in the path of an oncoming car. Faith wrapped her hand deeply into Mercedes' head of thick hair and pulled back roughly. She could hear the individual hairs stretching away from their roots. The action caused Mercedes to scream in pain. Faith could hear the sobs bubbling in her throat.

She quietly whispered, "If you get one tear on my floor, I will _break_ your neck."

F—Faith, please… I…"

"Shut up!" Faith thundered, sounding slightly like the grandfather she loved once. She tightened her grip and reverted to that calm, dangerous tone. "Listen carefully. I was raised in a business oriented family – the Newmans of Genoa City. Do you know them?"

That was a rhetorical question, but of course, Mercedes answered like Faith expected to.

Mercedes barely nodded and answered in a small voice. Not that she could with the near literal death grip in her hair. "Y—Yes."

"That brain _does_ have function, then. So, you understand that supply and demand is crucial to business. Let me give you a little impromptu lesson. When there is high supply, there is high demand and therefore, an increase in profits," Faith explained slowly, as if speaking to someone who was slow in comprehension. It was appropriate Faith thought, because Mercedes for all her beauty and being in one of the favourites among clients, she seemed to have forgotten how this business worked. "Here is what it comes down to, sweetheart. You are the supply and whatever the client demands, you give them. When you do, _my_ profits accumulate. Understand?"

Mercedes was silent and Faith pulled harder to get her attention.

"I said," Faith raised her voice, slightly, "do you _understand_?"

"Yes," Mercedes answered, normally, released her grip and stood.

"Good," Faith replied, still gazing down at the woman on the ground. Mercedes stood up on shaky feet and it reminded Faith of the movies she watched as a kid on nights with her grandparents. It reminded her of Bambi trying to stand on ice. "Now, you understand _in theory_ , but however, whether you understand _in practice_ is a different issue."

Mercedes' eyes carried a hint of fear and questioning.

"What are you going to do?"

Faith glowered at her, while fingering the flat gold necklace resting on her chest. "One," she lifted a slender index finger. "stop asking stupid questions. I've already slapped the falsies off you. Next time, I'll punch you in the face repeatedly because of the joy it will give me. Two," Faith smirked again. "I won't be doing anything. You, however, will be."

—

When Faith was a little girl, she hated making her bed because it was so tiring. Faith preferred to play with Whiskers and ride her horse, Sunny, on the trail. The stables were much more fun than staying in her room. The first time she did it, Faith rebelled by doing it the way she wanted to. Sometimes, that meant she wasn't going to do it properly or she simply did not do it at all. If she really wanted to be difficult, she would make the bed perfectly only to jump on it. It would be a mess worse than the first and she would laugh doing it. Faith only understood making her bed properly and perfectly every time because she did it under the watchful of her father, mother and even her grandfather. So, although she was estranged from her family, Faith admitted that she learned the importance of handling a job with perfection. When something was completed perfectly without error, it showed competency. When one became competent, the business became a competitor until there the consumer was satisfied Faith wanted those things. She wanted her girls perfect and her clients satisfied in more ways than one.

Faith carefully and skillfully kept her hand perfectly still, eye on the syringe filling up with a substance that resembled chlorine manufactured pool water. She smiled a little at the irony. It was from her personal stash. A cocktail of things melted down and mixed together. Faith was a lover of people and switched up the types of elixir she let ooze into her body. It made her warm and fuzzy. That warmth rose to being white hot and scorching, but Faith wasn't afraid of the fire. Rather, she welcomed it.

Mercedes was still in her dress but floating in and out of consciousness. Faith watched her go into that middle space where happiness was to the left of her and delirium to the right. Mercedes was bleary-eyed and laughed, not because she truly felt happy but because the chemicals triggered things that led to it. Faith hated doing this to Mercedes, but she had to learn the consequences for allowing her emotions to come to the fore. Emotions were a work hazard so it was Faith's job to stop it because it tainted everything.

Faith flicked the needle twice and when she deemed it to be to her liking, she walked over to Mercedes. The skinny, sharp end of the syringe glinted in the lights of one of many rooms of the apartments. This was highly unorthodox but for something to be done right, Faith had to watch from start to finish. She grabbed Mercedes' arm, already tightened with a rubber band from the first shot – LSD. It pressed down and applied pressure on the veins in Mercedes' arm. They surged with the task of passing blood to the human body. Faith wasn't here for a science lesson.

She applied the least bit of pressure as she wanted to slap Mercedes awake again. Faith didn't want that. She wanted this girl to be malleable, easily controlled and pliable. Faith watched as her steady hand pushed the sharp end of the needle pierce her skin, hitting a vein. Faith pushed the plunger in as the blue liquid disappeared gradually until there was nothing left. Mercedes cried out as Faith pulled out the needle and capped the end of it. She slid the syringe into a pocket in her jumper and watched as Mercedes twitched and gasped, brown eyes wide and a little wild.

She shook, eyes flitting around. Mercedes scratched at herself.

"What did you…do to me? Get them off. The bugs are everywhere!" Mercedes screeched. "Get them off of me. They're under my skin! Get them off I can't—" Faith cut her off by roughly by grabbing her face between her hands, forcing Mercedes to look into her eyes.

"Listen to me very carefully," Faith said, quietly. "You are an object. You are not allowed to feel. You're not allowed to have emotions. They are hazardous. You are not allowed to _think_. The only feelings you're allowed to feel is the sensation of a dick buried so deeply inside your cunt it hurts. You are only allowed to feel a dick pound your ass so hard, you'll never take a good shit again."

Faith grabbed her harder, causing her pain so Mercedes would focus on the job.

"I'm burning… God, I'm fucking burning…" the girl on the bed moaned and began to claw at herself again. Mercedes couldn't focus on her so Faith did finally slap her in the face, harder than the first once again. Maybe, the pain would make her pay attention.

Faith continued. "The only thought you are allowed to have is wondering how you can suck his dick well enough. The only thought you are allowed to have consists of wondering how will swallow the cum you taste on your tongue without choking. And never forget, think about all of the ways I will punish you if you fuck up again. I'm off my meds, but I don't need to be off those pills to tear you to pieces until you decide you'd prefer to _die_ instead."

The door to the elaborately decorated room – she called this the Red Light Room, only used in special circumstances – opened. It was literally lit with a red light causing by coloured light bulbs. The king sized bed had a gothic, Victorian feel with its dark sheets, headboard with elaborate carvings and the all black beddings. The footsteps entering the room had expensive shoes on the feet, a grey suit with a back tie and matching cloth in the right pocket. The jawline was strong and had the light splattering of stubble. Green eyes met hers and with a raise of his large hand, the two men at his side disappeared through the open door before it closed shut. The man in the grey suit then grinned at her, revealing perfect straight, white teeth.

"Ah, Faith Newman," he says, smoothly, lightly fingering a lock of her blonde hair. She gently pulled it away with a smile that matched his, fingering his silver wedding band before dropping it. He took her hand again, brought it to his lips, kissing the knuckle. He let go. "Always lovely to see you, darlin'. You remembered my favourite room."

"Well, Mr. Vice President, the pleasure is always mine. How could I forget?" Faith replied, running a hand along his lapel of his expensive tailored suit. She turned around, pinning Mercedes a look, although the smile never left her face. Mercedes realized where she was, and walked over "Turn around, Mercedes."

Faith watched Mercedes with a hawk's eye as she turned around, giving the Vice President a flirty smile. The Vice President circled around her, looking Mercedes over as if viewing a piece of art before he made a purchase. Faith watched him looking her over. He stared at Mercedes' curves, running a hand along her hips and squeezing the softness of her ass. He smirked with satisfaction and meet Faith's watchful gaze with hungry eyes.

"I trust you're satisfied?"

He licked his lips. "You've outdone yourself."

"Isn't that the point? This girl's name is Mercedes. She's a favourite and of course, she's all yours. Do with her whatever you wish."

Vice-President Xavier Griffith looked down at Mercedes, roughly turned her around and slowly pulled down the zipper of her dress. He pulled down the material revealing a smooth back and full, round breasts. His big hand travelled around Mercedes' front and he felt her smooth, tanned abdomen and went upward to circle a hardened nipple before he squeezed the breast attached to it. He pressed to Mercedes' shoulder. Faith glanced down and saw the beginnings of an erection between his legs.

"Beautiful," he breathed, pressing a kiss to the shoulder. Mercedes moaned, making Faith happy satisfied herself. She slipped into a chair comfortably, crossing her legs. Like her parents watched Faith to oversee the neatness of her bed, she would oversee making sure Mercedes got fucked into this bed and fucked the Vice President well in return. His hands lingered at her shoulders, and he ran them over the soft curves. Faith raised a questioning eyebrow at the politician when he stared at her, speaking again. "I intend to, although I have a theory."

"Which is what exactly?" Faith questioned, mildly intrigued. Xavier had always been funny that way. She walked over to the bar, adjacent to the bed and poured whiskey out of a glass decanter into a short glass before walking over and taking her seat again. She laughed, lightly, tapping her nail on the surface of her glass. It produced a high, sharp sound.

"I'll be more effective with this lovely specimen here," the vice-president paused to finger a lock of Mercedes' auburn-coloured hair and wrapped it around his large finger, "if I imagine these hands to be yours. I've always enjoyed your hands I've always loved your…everything.."

Faith laughed again, taking a sip of the amber coloured liquid.

"You're not paying for _me,_ " she answered, raising her glass to him, in part jest with a knowing smile and with the air of a smart aleck. She had always been one. Faith had always been a smart ass, even as little girl with innocence twinkling and bright in her blue eyes. "However, many thanks for the free amusement, Xavier."

—

"Put your ass into it, Mercedes," Faith coached mockingly, lighting a cigarette between her lips. The usually orange glow took on a red hue due to the whole room being lit in red. Hence, the Red Light Room. She took a deep drag and blew smoke circles out above her. The vice-president was an interesting man, one who was married with two young children. Yet Faith had something of a flirtation with him only understood by the two of them. She could admit that much. She would neither confirm or deny whether that flirtation had been moved into sexual territory in the confines a special space. Perhaps, it had locked away into some sacred space such as this one. It wasn't hers to share nor was it hers to expose. Faith, however, knew Xavier had a sexual appetite unmatched by any of the other clients. He was insatiable and it was something the Second Lady could not satisfy. He kept coming back and she kept keeping him around because he was one of her favourites with one of the deepest pockets.

Faith took another deep drag, the tip of the cigarette getting shorter. She exhaled again, blowing out a steady cloud of smoke. She closed her eyes to the soundtrack of the vice-president's steady, guttural grunts of exertion as he buried his cock into Mercedes' round ass. He held her and mounted her, while she cried out. Whether it was in pain, or she was enjoying it, Faith didn't care all that much. It wasn't about her satisfaction anyway. Faith kept her eyes closed, the nicotine buzzing like electricity in the marrow of her bones.

"That's it…sweetheart," Xavier grunted. "Beg me. Beg me! What do you want me to do to you?"

"Fuck me…harder, please Mr. President…" Mercedes moaned on the next thrust in. "Ahh…you're the real President…I pledge _allegiance_ to you!"

Faith brought the cigarette to her glossed lips again. The smoke settled in her lungs, expanding them and saturating them with cancer-inducing mist. Who the fuck cared about cancer when they were going to all die anyway? She could feel that bastard's mouth against her clit as it hardened under her palm and she rubbed it against the smooth white fabric of her jumper. She exhaled, releasing smoke and a quiet curse between her teeth. He was pumping her faster and stronger. Her breath came out shaky as Xavier's grunts got more guttural. It felt as though he was fucking her, burying his dick not inside Mercedes but inside of _her_.

"Fuck you," she hissed, feeling herself dripping wet and on the brink of an orgasm. Her pussy throbbed and she felt herself getting soaked and the impending explosion was almost too much to bear. She could feel the sweat on her skin. "Fuck…you, Xavier."

Finally, the vice president came into Mercedes with one final prolonged sound. Mercedes cried out as the cum and its warmth filled her ass from the hardened penis. Faith orgasmed, arching her back, while in her chair. Sweat broke out on her skin while her lungs did burst, cigarette long forgotten and put out and laying in an ash tray.

She opened her eyes, her vision clearing from white to red. Faith saw red everywhere and her breathing slowed, and she locked angry eyes with the Vice-President. He wasn't supposed to burrow under her skin and literally fuck with her. Faith stood to find Mercedes on her stomach, her ass still full of cum. Faith saw more red. This time, the red was from Mercedes as it started to well up. She cried out, shaking yet smiling as if to ask if this punishment sufficed. Her breathing was even but shaky. The vice-president's cock hung limp and free, as he stood naked. His skin glistened with sweat. Xavier's chest was hairy and there was a happy trail of dark hair. A six-pack defined itself on his stomach, and his arms were muscular, the surface of his back enthralling to watch.

Faith's rage made itself known in the form of a dark, scaly monster roaring so loudly in her head, everything else sounded like a vacuum. She stormed over, grabbed Meredith by her hair, opened the door and threw her out. Mercedes' hair fell like a curtain over her face, makeup no longer flawless but smudged. Faith couldn't tell where the eyeshadow began and where the lipstick ended. Her eyeliner made her look like a half-dead raccoon but her heels.

She threw the black heels on Mercedes' form on the ground, as she lay outside the Red Room with her black dress askew and her black heels around her.

"Get up!" Faith growled, kicking her with the point of her heel. "The mayor needs her pussy ate out! Do you understand?"

Mercedes shook on the floor, tears running down her face.

"I…" Mercedes started to answer, her face contorted in pain, "…understand… I understand… I…" she trailed off and screamed again, beginning to claw at her body wildly and making her dress askew. She continued screaming until, Faith surmised, her throat became raw. A heavy cocktail of drugs would do that. "I can't… I can't… I can't… They're eating me! They're—oh, my God! Make them go away! The spiders are…biting me! They're—" Mercedes let out a blood curdling scream.

Faith sighed, gesturing to men of her own standing out in the hallway. They were there to dispose of any trash, or to make sure the discretion of her clients was intact. Sometimes, both, while the Vice President's own muscle stayed out of sight.

"Donnie. Evan. Take care of that," she gestured to Mercedes, who was a screaming, crying mess on the brink of vomiting. Her black dress started to be stained from the blood from her ass. Well, at least, Mercedes was a good girl and finally did her job. The men paused, looked at each other, at Mercedes and then at her. This annoyed Faith more. "Are you deaf? Put her anywhere! Kill her! Bury her! Fuck herself yourselves and come on her entire body if you want. I don't care. Just dispose of it!"

She squeezed her eyes shut against the closed door, Mercedes and her screaming were getting further and further away. No, no, no. Not those fucking lithium clouds. They weren't going to ruin her sunshine. The bright lights weren't going to get inside her brain and expel the monster away. Faith opened her eyes, leaning against the door as the monster's roar became a dull vibration. She tried to pet it, keep it calm so the lithium didn't make it mad. She wanted to feel the ridges of its scales. Faith ran her palm against their edges as its breathing became a steady hum. She cried out, one of the scales slicing her palm. Faith opened her palm, the gash across it deep and her blood changed from red to black.

She smiled and closed her palms, letting it drip so it stained her.

Darkness became stark against light.

Faith opened her eyes and as she rounded on the vice-president, they flashed an icy blue.

Xavier shrugged, as she took slow steps toward him. He had managed to get his pants on, and was buttoning his shirt. His eyes were the colour of green swamp water as he smiled at her and reached out to touch her cheek. She frowned, the monster resting somewhere in her chest now. Faith grabbed his wrist, digging her fingernails into it.

"Never, ever," Faith ground out, between her teeth, "do that again."

"I told you," the politician said in a whisper as if the red room had sprouted ears, "you, my dear, are priceless."

He kissed her. He kissed her slowly but Faith would not let him rattle her again. The Vice President was merely a customer and she was merely providing a service. She had to remind him. Faith kissed him back, pushing him back until he was pulled down into the bed. Faith kissed him with ferocity, pulling his dark hair painfully. She could feel his hand finger the roundness of her breasts. Faith could feel his penis harden itself once again between her legs and she fought the urge to groan at the friction.

She kissed him once more, taking Xavier's bottom lip between her teeth and bit hard enough until she could taste copper and metal in her mouth.

Xavier pulled away, bottom lip slightly bloody.

"Nice doing business with you, Faith Newman," he whispered, looking up at her.

"Likewise, Mr. Vice President," she whispered, wiping the blood off his bottom lip with her thumb. She saw the blood red on the pads of her thumb. "Likewise."

—

Faith stared out of her window again. It was one of those nights where eventually night would fall upon New York City and burst alive. The neon lights of buildings would light the way wide toad to hell where many people travelled. Running a hand through her blonde hair, she leaned her head against the window. It was cool against her skin and she smiled. It was cold like her so therefore, it made perfect sense. The Vice President, a man who was only second to the leader of the Free World himself, slinked away and quickly he entered. He disappeared into the red walls. His guards evaporated, too.

She never slept with him before he left. Rather, it was a message – one to never get to that secret part of her. It was one that said she would hurt him if he did that again when Faith grabbed his penis and stroked it a little too roughly. Faith kissed him and bit his lips hard enough to draw blood to tell him that yes, they had an undefined dynamic between them, but it would be bloody for him if he pushed the boundaries. He was allowed to be as rough he wanted with her girls, but never her. He was never allowed anything with her. There was a certain sense of business related accomplishment that settled comfortably in her gut. It was in her blood. It was part of her design and ensnared in the double helix of her DNA. It was as if she could drive headfirst under the wheels of an eighteen-wheeler truck of Newman rules and guidelines and still survive with none of them followed and adhered to. Like she would ride a unicycle into the flames of hell covered in sweet smelling gasoline, remaining completely silent as the flames peeled back skin, singed her hair and burned through muscle and tendon. How could there be rules and guidelines in the Newman family when the tree sat somewhere, twisted and gnarled with poisonous roots? Faith felt as though she could climb onto the very top of the Statue of Liberty and jump, only to explode over the Hudson. She wanted more power. She wanted more fear from others who dared to get in her way. Faith wanted to cause more powerful earthquakes and forest fires with just the utterance of her name.

The red fabric of her night robe was smooth against her skin and she remembered the blood on her tongue. Soon, she would step in her dark realm and continue to rule with her ruthlessness and her manicured fist of steel. Iron was not strong enough. Faith stared out and the Empire State Building caught her eye. She felt nostalgic, her memory unwrapping a clear of the other tower. It was grand and so tall, she thought it could touch the sky and be eye-to-eye with God himself. She wanted it – her Tower of Babel engraved in the highest heaven and her dark castle in Hades, lit by hot flames.

She reached for her tablet, a sound alerting her to a new notification in the news. Faith walked over to her couch with her drink and settled into it. Faith took a healthy amount of vodka and set it on her expensive coffee table. There was a new story in the business section. Blue eyes scanned the headline over and over. They scanned the big black bold letters. They screamed louder than her. They seemed to open the clouds, lithium pills hitting her skin and burning it like acid rain.

No, no, no, no—

 **NEWMAN ENTERPRISES POWER SHIFT  
NICHOLAS NEWMAN IN AS NEW CEO, ABBY NEWMAN RAYBURN OUT**

 _Nicholas Newman In—_

"This isn't right," Faith said to no one numbly. The monster in her head roused itself from its slumber and started tearing at her. Its claws shredded her lungs. Its powerful legs pounded her chest until her ribcage snapped like twigs and her sternum was dust. It bared its fangs with a deep hiss, canines dripping with that black acidic poison.

"This…isn't—Dad is—"

She couldn't—no, that was wrong.

"This is wrong! This is _fucking_ wrong!" she yelled, throwing her tablet against a wall where it cracked. A jagged ugly crack ran through the middle as it dimed and died, never to light up with the push of a button again. "This is not right! _No_!"

Its teeth were longer, sharper and its jaws seemed like it could unhinge and swallow her whole. It advanced forward, pressing itself against Faith's skull. The forked tongue was long enough to lick her, saliva turning her skin black. Finally, the monster buried its teeth inside of her. Faith felt not only its teeth but all of it inside her. It grounded itself in her head, bit into her beating heart and coiled itself around the little silver core of her—it squeezed that little piece of glittering silver still there from childhood. It squeezed until the little piece of silver was gone. It tore to pieces and lay around her like glitter. An infinite number of pieces scattered around her like stardust.

Faith shook, as she crumpled the floor against a wall. There was black on the periphery and soon, there would be nothing but darkness in front of her. She wanted her fucking tower. She wanted the castle. Faith Newman wanted the expansion of her empire—first New York, then the world. All 7 billion people on this planet have the name Faith Cassidy Newman on their lips.

The lithium on the ground grew roots and sprouted beautiful purple flowers with poisonous red berries. They had to leave. The plants had to wither and die. She didn't want them. Faith would not consume them. The monster made whatever silver part of her soul break like the thin thread of a spider web and it roared loudly at its accomplishment.

Faith heard that roar again and it all shattered. The glass cut her and the shrapnel was sharp enough to nearly kill her. The monster roared in her head again, louder and louder than the first. Just to kill the lithium plants and put herself together, she screamed too. She didn't know whether or not, she stopped.

* * *

 **charlie ashby**

One day, Charlie Ashby was going to have to make a choice between who he was and who some part of him craved to be. He was the quintessential good guy. He never had any enemies or rivals in the unofficial group of misfits Charlie found himself entrenched in. He liked to think he was the most sane although he didn't want to be hailed as the glue. How the hell could be anyone's reason for being put together when a self-contained mess churned inside of him? Charlie felt himself split in halves, sometimes in quarters. Charlie seemed to be the guy to offer a shoulder or an ear to bend. Not deal with this.

The basketball game was a much-needed distraction. As in every situation, He could be a normal guy who got good grades but wasn't anal about school. He could be the guy that cracked jokes and got everyone else laughing even hanging out at his apartment. They were all there because he had the best collection of booze. Even Ice Princess Katie who was wiping the remnants of cocaine from her nose burst out laughing. Charlie was pretty sure it was from the drugs, and not him, though. She sat on Moses' lap and somewhere in between the joke and the laughing, they had started making out.

"Can you guys not?" Ava asked, wrinkling her nose. Katie pulled away from Moses and smirked.

"Sweetie, does this interfere with your purity?" she replied, with false sweetness. "Does this bother you because of that bright, shinning perfection you work so hard to keep. Don't worry, cuz. Stick your finger down that throat deep enough and it will all work out."

Ava's green eyes narrowed. "You _bitch_."

Charlie made a move to go to her or least, after her. He felt a twinge of guilt because he had invited when she said no. But he pushed and now, here was she being devoured by her cousin – a wolf in human form. He knew Ava was no wallflower or lamb, however. So, there was that silver lining. Still, it didn't stop Charlie from feeling bad. Ava caught his gaze, pleaded with him with her own gaze back and a barely seen shake off her head. But not before she gave Katie one of the coldest glares he'd ever seen from her.

"I hope you die soon. Count the pills. Make sure the dose in high enough!" Ava snapped. That made Katie laugh. "When you swallow them, I hope you choke on that venom you like to throw around."

Katie fingered the end of Ava's blonde hair and Charlie watched her to slow steps of her to meet Ava eye-to-eye. Two Newmans with claws bared. Charlie also saw two Abbotts ready to strike. If Ava was frost, Charlie knew Katie was going to be a polar vortex.

"I hope I'm lucky enough to die like Marilyn. I _aspire_ to. Try not to outshine me when I'm dead. Not like you can do it while I'm alive anyway."

Charlie remembered their fights. They were more like cage matches. This one was at a formal function they didn't care about but had to be there. They all did. Katie had backhanded Ava across the face, freezing everyone including to their spots including their parents. Ava punched Katie in the mouth. To return the favour, Katie smashed a bottle against the bar and cut the side of Ava's head with it and kicked her in the ribs so hard, Charlie went to her as she doubled over wheezing. Katie smirked wiping the blood off her lips with the back of her hand, red streaks against the pale skin. Charlie watched as Ava found her rage again and attempted to go after Katie again, but somewhere in the haze of swearing, searing insults, thrown punches, resonating slaps and equally hard kicks, their dads had intervened and pulled them apart. The blood from Ava's cut bled down her face, streaking her face and blonde hair red. Charlie watched her face as she tried to mask the pain as she leaned against her dad who was sternly telling her stitches and that he was going to check her ribs out. Ava refused every time as she continued to bleed, ready to strike again but her mother shielded her. Katie, on the other hand, had to be restrained by her dad and both uncles, beautiful yet feral as the three men struggling to contain her flames. True to form, she drunkenly yelled around Ava as Reed joined in, attempting to futilely talk her down, and extinguish her, "I win, Ava! You think I'm scared of a little blood?" she laughed again, cruel and sharp and Charlie watched Victoria flinch behind her hard exterior at the sound. "I'm _Katie fucking Abbott_!"

Charlie watched Ava glance away as if she seemed to absorb another one of her cousin's barbs. Ava was an emotional sponge that way, only bleeding out the murky water Katie verbally and physically drenched on her. She looked at Katie again, blonde hair not as golden to his eyes anymore. Her eyes were the colour of forest moss.

"I need to sharpen my batting average," Ava finally said, quiet in her rage this time. "Don't push me to practice on you until they find your brain matter."

She shoved past Katie and stormed out with angry strides out Charlie's door and down the hall to the elevators downstairs. Charlie watched Katie shrug as if Ava's leaving was as common as the wind blowing because to her, it was.

Katie directed a glance at Johnny who raised an eyebrow when he looked at her. He twisted a ring on his middle finger with his thumb. She said, ignoring Ava's departure altogether. "Okay, new development! It seems Lucy continues to hide in Bali from you, big brother."

Charlie saw Moses tense at the use of the nickname as Katie still used as him as her perch.

Johnny shrugged, lighting another cigarette. "I don't care. She can choke on Winters' dick instead."

Moses slid Katie off his lap, gently and drew himself up to his full height. He walked over to Johnny until they were staring each other down. It was deathly quiet until Moses pulled back his fist and hit Johnny in the lip, drawing blood. Charlie didn't have to figure out what had set Moses off. Lucy. It was always Lucy.

"Apologize, Abbott. Now!"

Johnny recovered from the blow, laughing. He wiped the blood off with a thumb and then punched Moses three times so hard in the gut, Moses grunted and caught himself on the ground and held his side. Charlie watched as Katie ran to Johnny, standing between him and Moses. It was true what they had said. Johnny and Katie Abbott had monsters simmering beneath their surface.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Katie screamed at her brother. Johnny's eyes were cold, face blank and the features hard. Their parents had been right when they said people called their mother Ice Queen. Maybe Johnny was Victoria Newman's son that way. Charlie watched Johnny stare at Moses with those eyes. Katie's own blue ones flashed white hot. What an interesting contrast. "What the hell, Johnny?"

"He wrinkled my suit, Kate and he annoys me generally. You know I'll kill _anyone_ for that," he simply replied, looking at her and glanced at Moses, who stood up and opened and then closed his hand, ready to swing again. Charlie knew Moses. He knew him well enough to know that Moses loved Lucy, and in some weird way, he couldn't understand, loved Katie. In both cases, Charlie observed, Johnny was his trigger. "I will fuck Lucy and make you watch next time, Winters. Pretty sure she fucks you and says my name anyway," he added with a loose shrug, "so, it wouldn't be that hard _._ She always comes back to me."

Moses started to go for Johnny again and this time, Charlie intervened.

"Chill, Moses. Bro, it's not worth it. Stop. He's f _ucking_ with you, man!"

Johnny laughed, unbothered.

With a sarcastic smile, he pointed at Charlie, "It's been fun, Ashby!"

He then left, closing the door so loudly, it rattled. His expensive Italian leather shoes tapped the floor and grew distant with every step he took. Charlie sighed, rubbing his head to stop an impending headache already on its way. Moses cursed and locking his jaw resolved to leave. Charlie watched Katie look at him with something close to pleading eyes, touching his arm. He looked at her, gently pulled her hand away and kissed her on the lips before exiting. Suddenly, it was just Charlie and her. Katie looked at her manicured nails, tousled her thick head of dark hair and grabbed her purse. Her dark heels click-clacked to his couch as she pulled on her black leather jacket, a stark contrast to the pink, strapless dress with the flirty skirt. Katie turned around, making the skirt of her dress fan out with the quick movement.

She turned toward his door to walk away, but Charlie beat her to it with long strides and stood in front of her. Katie's red lips curled into a smirk as she raised a perfectly done brow. Her blue eyes twinkled with amusement.

"Hmm. This got intriguing really quick. If you wanted alone time with me, you should have just asked. I've discovered my own place of this afternoon. My uncle just needs to give me the keys tomorrow but it's beautiful. Big. Quiet. Plenty of rooms," Katie purred, running a hand up his chest. He caught her hand before she reached his shoulder. Charlie grabbed her wrist and she laughed, taking it back. "Ah, Charlie Ashby, the one less fucked up than all of us. My cousin's chivalrous knight in blinding armour. Who the hell knew? Of course, _I_ did through the grapevine that will never reach our parents because they're too stupid. Or afraid.

He relaxed his grip and Katie retrieved it from him. Now, it was Charlie's turn to be intrigued. He looked at her quizzically.

"Knew what?"

"Your extracurricular activities, of course," she revealed, with a wink. "This is just another secret. I'll let you have it because who am I judge you? I guess, it's not surprising. No one is ever that polite. Or that level-headed. Nobody is ever that centered. Not even you."

Charlie's jaw clenched, a rattling in his lungs. Katie's words hit in like porcupine needles. He could felt invisible quick fingers slowly start to undo the stitching he had carefully sewn.

"There it is," Katie said, after the pause between them. She hid a smile. "It's in your eyes."

The best thing about his standpoint was that he was been the observer. Everyone had their own behaviours. Everyone had their own thought processes. Katie had been the most interesting to observe because her thought process was two-fold. She was methodical and calculating. Yet in all that human chess playing, she was chaotic, making sure she took everyone down with her. Katie reminded him of a cat who truly did have nine lives, although it seemed infinite. She could be flirtatious when she wanted to be and scratched to the bone with her claws. There was an alarming grace with which she moved between people, and through people while pulling multiple puppet strings at the same. He only learned that Katie Abbott buried any emotion so deeply that when it bubbled fast to the surface, she became overwhelmed with pain. This made her medicate or lash out at those around her. Sometimes, both. It was just something he picked up in general terms.

"Does Mattie know?" she questioned, tilting her head slightly. "I would think twins would be in tune with deep shit like that."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he shrugged, coolly with a laugh.

Just like the Cheshire Cat, she grinned from ear to ear. She always did have claws.

Katie winked, tapping her nails against her obviously expensive clutch. Charlie mused that she had a taste for everything. He had to concede, however, that a Katherine Abbott party was always something between a rave and a circus with orgies sprinkled here and there. No, he was not even kidding about the orgies. She nodded, blue eyes the colour of a sea churning with a slow building whirlwind in its center.

"You know, Charlie," Katie said finally, with a smile that was anything but warm. Warmth, Charlie observed, from Katie was as rare as seeing the Loch Ness monster, "you were always my favourite person. Guess I know why now."

"We're not friends."

"Friends of friends of friends. I still like you. Or something close to it," Katie answered, flippantly and shrugged. "Always have."

Charlie sighed, exasperated.

"What are you saying, Katie?"

"I'm saying that I understand," she answered with a rare rawness and honesty. He knew it to be genuine and true although it left as quickly as it came. The usual conspiratorial smile, Katie sashayed through his apartment, heels clicking down the hall to the elevators.

Charlie closed his door and prayed he could be still the sanest of them all.

—

That was yesterday.

Today, Charlie was driving to Crimson Lights, trying to figure out why Ava would text him. It was probably because he was a good guy. But Katie's words rang in his head because in all her shit-stirring, there was a kernel of truth. Nobody was above being corrupted. Not even him. Especially not him.

He pulled into Crimson Lights and parked. Charlie shoved his gym bag from the passenger seat to the back one and pulling his keys out. He got out of it, locking his car. He scanned the bevy of customers for a blonde girl with the green eyes. They weren't just green but a light mint green and on the off chance he stood close enough to her, Charlie could see the flecks of blue in her irises. Charlie walked in and figured he would get an iced tea so he entered the coffee shop through the patio. He stopped in his tracks when he spotted her. Ava sat there, eyes downcast and picking at her chocolate brownie. Her hair was in a ponytail and Charlie could see she had been crying.

"Hey," Charlie greeted, gently and making Ava snap to attention before she relaxed and realized it was him. "I got your texts, Ava. But if you want to be alone..."

"No, no," Ava said immediately, shaking her head. "I mean, I texted you. It would be stupid to have texted you over here and only to send you away. Sit. Please?"

"Okay," Charlie agreed and sat. He eyed her. "What's up?"

Ava grew quiet, pushing her brownie away. She bit her bottom lip to keep from crying but sniffled and wiped at a tear on her face. "I don't know how she does it," she said, at last, voice breaking. "I went to Newman today. There was a board meeting. My mom was doing fine as CEO. All of a sudden," she continued, explaining, growing angrier, "Aunt Victoria gets a mysterious letter."

Charlie eyed her, confused but chose to listen. "Okay," he said, prompting her.

"Grandpa gave her more shares than the rest of us grandchildren. Before I was even born. She was two. Long story short, Aunt Victoria now has those shares so even though the voting were tied, she would have the strong influence in voting. Uncle Nick runs it, but Aunt Victoria owns the whole thing. I'm not mad at her, because Katie played her. Her own mother," she paused, looking away before new and how tears could fall down her flushed cheeks. "Aunt Victoria voted for Uncle Nick. I knew she would because it's always been the two of them. They're the kids of Grandpa's true love while Mom has been the Newman looking inside from the outside. Maybe because I'm not Nikki's grandchild and Katie is… And you know what the scary thing is? She got into Uncle Nick's head. She played with it! He's never been about Newman even with Grandpa is long gone. My uncle is the mellow person I know. I saw it, Charlie."

"Saw it?"

"A switch went off in his head. He was still the same, but something flipped," Ava explained and snapped her fingers. "Just like that. Something shifted inside of him. Something changed behind his eyes. It's like… Katie pushed a button in his head and triggered it. Katie played Aunt Victoria, Uncle Nick and my mom all at once. I saw my mom nearly break to pieces. She did. I hate her for that. She can control _anybody_."

Charlie blinked and gently cut her off. "Stop it. You are giving her too much power."

"I can't give her what she already has. She's _untouchable_."

He smiled with a knowing laugh and there was a frown on Ava's glossed lips.

"I'm not laughing at you, I swear. I'm laughing because you're on the same level as her. You're a Newman and an Abbott. Just like her. Just like Johnny."

"I know that!" Ava snapped, and closed her eyes, apologizing. "I…know. But this isn't about that. It's about…everything," she shook her head and gestured to the abandoned chocolate dessert on her plate. It was topped with whipped cream, too. "You know I bought that and told myself I was going to eat it. All of it. Then I was going to go home, lock the bathroom door, play some music and puke it back up so my parents couldn't hear the sound. Then I would hate myself and stress eat more. Or, I was going to find new places to cut myself so my dad didn't have to stitch my wrists up, or watch my mom cry and beg me to stop…" she trailed off, and covered her mouth and suppressing the sobs. Ava sniffled, wiping at her eyes with a Crimson Lights napkin. "Charlie, I have a question. Please be honest with me."

Charlie stared at her, and saw the earnestness in her eyes. Those mint coloured eyes pierced some deep part of him. He nodded.

"Yeah. Go ahead."

"Do you…" she started, and began to play with the bracelets on her wrists and sighed starting again. "Do you think I'm pretty?"

Charlie almost had to strain his ear to make sure that question from her. Of course, Charlie knew the answer to that but he had never been faced with it. It had never been handed to him on the metaphorical silver platter. Charlie stared into her eyes which seemed to be at their brightest when she was happy. There was a radiance about Ava and her smile stunned him. Her laugh rang in his ears, long after he had heard it. The setting sun as she ran here and there while playing flag football with him and some of his buddies made her seem like she had strands of gold in her hair. When she jumped effortlessly and caught passes, the sun gave her a natural halo. Her victory cartwheel and dance when their team won flag football made Charlie laugh so much, his sides hurt.

"Yo! Rayburn! Come throw down with us again," Buchanan smiled at the end of the game and offered her a fist to bump. She did and smiled with a nod.

"I'll be there," Ava promised, bumping the larger fist. "Definitely."

"Nice," Buchanan said once more, and clasped hands with Charlie. He then added when Ava was out of earshot. "Your girl is a badass. Hurry up and tell her, or I'll date her, man."

Those words meant nothing when it was measured against the bigger picture. But when it came to the context of Charlie Ashby and Ava Rayburn, he didn't think she was pretty. He thought she was _beautifu_ l. The fact that she wanted to be a doctor just like her dad was admirable. Charlie respected that a lot and it was one of the many things he loved about her.

"No," Charlie blurted out, voicing his inside thought. Before his head caught up to his brain, Charlie was snapped out of his reverie when he saw the hurt in her eyes and the concealed surprise then pain in her face.

"Wow…" Ava replied, blinking and moved quickly to leave. She looked as if she wanted to run away from him, from everything that had happened in her day. She grabbed her car keys from the table and stuffed them in the pockets of her jeans. She spoke softly, avoiding his eyes. Charlie felt awful – worse because things had been lost in translation and he didn't intend for that to happen. She had chosen him. Ava chose to open up to him and it seemed as though he had replied with coldness. She stuffed her phone in the back pocket of her jeans. "I'm sorry, Charlie. That was a stupid question. Sorry I wasted your time."

Ava turned around and took quick strides to the parking lot. Charlie saw that blonde ponytail move further and further away from his line of vision.

"Shit," Charlie cursed to himself, and propelled by the motivation for honesty and adrenaline, broke out into a run. He ran across the parking lot until he could see her and hoped he could hear her. "Ava, hold up!"

She turned to look at him and then turned around, working at getting her dark blue car open so she could slide into the driver's side and go. Charlie finally got to her, breathing hard but blocking her so she couldn't get to the driver's side. Ava blinked at him, before looking at him with a resigned shrug.

"Look, Charlie. I get it. I'm not Katie. I don't have some dark magic hold on men and _women_ that somehow makes them want to fuck me on sight. I don't have red hair like Lucy. I'm not even Bella, all small, innocent, and sweet. She has both of my cousins stupidly gone for her which I don't get but it's not my business. I'm just…me," she sighed, looking at him finally. "Tall, blonde, not-pretty me. I really value your opinion so I mean it when I say…thanks."

"Ava, stop, please. Hear me out."

"Why?" Ava questioned him, throwing her hands up. "I don't need a Venn diagram accompanied with your answer. I don't need a research paper on it either."

"I said no because I don't think you're pretty," Charlie spoke, looking her directly in the eyes. Ava crossed her arms and rolled her eyes at this. "I misspoke. I was shocked you asked me that because how could you not see what I see? I was baffled. I didn't mean to hurt you."

Ava whispered, asking tentatively, "Well…what do you see in me?"

Charlie took her hand and it felt like a cloud against his skin. Her palms were warm against her. It wasn't the kind of heat that triggered forest fires and emanated everywhere like Katie's destructive heat. Ava's warmth was contained, and concentrated. It didn't burn. It didn't even singe him. Ava's warmth was like the soothing heat a person got from a fireplace on a cold winter night.

He smiled, softly, "I see a girl with so much happiness, it's contagious. When you laugh, it's the most beautiful sound I've ever heard. I see," he continued, still holding her hand. He caught the blush rising in her cheeks, "a girl so badass, she can hang with the guys and have victory dances that are so silly but doesn't care who's watching."

Ava's eyes were locked on his, and his hand moved to her wrist. Charlie gently traced the fading pink scars on her right one. Charlie felt her flinch under him, as if they were fresh and were still painful.

"I see a girl with battle scars that would break anyone but is stronger than she realizes. I see a girl with a smile so bright, it comes from inside," Charlie whispered, hands on her face. "I see a girl who can't lose that smile. I'm just Charlie. The guy who wants to work to keep it there. Always."

Ava blinked at him, and slowly smiled at him before she beat him to it and kissed him. She kissed him, softly and then it grew more intense. It was as if she were telling him that yes, she understood. It was as if Ava was telling he could the guy who made her smile, made her feel as special as she was. Ava was telling him in her kiss that she would let him in and he was welcome to him. Charlie returned the intensity in his own, his hand somehow finding the rest of the warmth and heat buzzing under her skin and his hands intertwined in the gold of her hair. When they pulled apart, she was flushed and he was speechless.

"Wow," Ava breathed against his mouth.

"Yeah, I know," Charlie replied, longing to show her how beautiful she was. "Your place or mine?"

Ava stared at him and pressed another kiss to his mouth.

"Yours. I'll meet you there."

—

Twenty minutes later, Ava had him in all four elements. He felt earth. Earth was her honesty and openness. Water was Ava's soothing way of making shitty situations not so bad. Fire was in the smile that made her glow from within. Wind was in the carefree she moved, especially now, in his arms and in his bed. Charlie started at her and drank all her in: the way Ava's hair fanned out on his pillow, the way she stared at him with eyes that said she did want him as much as he wanted her, her breasts as her pink nipples hardened under his touch, the smoothness of her abdomen as he pressed soft kisses to it that left her sighing softly, her long legs as they parted for him. He felt himself growing hard. Charlie slid his cock into her, feeling her wetness and the tightness of her vagina. Ava arched her back and pulled him in closer.

"You're so beautiful," Charlie whispered, stroking her face.

"Charlie…please…please…" Ava begged, softly and she closed her eyes and let him pump her. He could feel her. He could feel every part of her. Charlie groaned as he continued steadily tempo and she raised her hips to meet him and take in more of him.

She laughed which turned into another moan as he felt himself on the edge. Finally, Ava orgasmed under him saying his name. When she did, it settled in his ears, cradled his heart and encircled a part of him near his soul. Just as she had given her warmth to her, Charlie thrusted one more time and came, giving all of the warmth he had back to her. Then with Charlie still inside of and intertwined with her, he kissed her again and Ava squealed against his mouth as he squeezed both cheeks of her ass.

He finally pulled out of her and she pressed a kiss to his chest. Charlie let the tips of his fingers dance along the curve of her shoulder. Ava grew quiet and sighed.

"Hey. What are you thinking of?"

She turned around in his arms, and looked up at him. Ava seemed to glow again.

"Just how right this feels with you," Ava admitted. She added with a shake of her head. "Even with my ex, it didn't feel right anymore. Even after he cheated on me with Katie, it didn't feel authentic. This, right here, you and me? It feels real," she said, softly. "I'm sorry, I never saw you. I do now."

Charlie kissed her hair, smelling the mango scent of her shampoo.

"I won't hurt you, you know. I never will. I know your heart's battered and bruised, but," Charlie paused to look with her fingers and trace the lines etched in her palm, "if you could trust me with it, I'll protect it."

Ava gazed at him, tears filling her eyes as she kissed him. "I do," she kissed him again. "I do trust you… Let me show how much."

Charlie kissed her again as she rolled on top of him and straddled him. She brushed herself against his cock, awakening every nerve in his body. Each tiny nerve vibrated until they burst like their own firework. Charlie heard the popping in his ears as she stroked him. He closed his eyes and said her name between his teeth. Ava smiled at the feel of his erection as his penis throbbed and moaned in satisfaction. She opened her legs for him and guided herself into him as she sighed with a blissful on her face.

Her hair fell like a curtain over her face and she brought up a hand up her hair to comb it back so he could take in from soft lines and the features of her face: her heart shaped face, her almond shaped eyes, the apples of her cheeks and her smooth nose at a perfect length. She rode him slow so he could feel her again, and then she rode him speeding up.

Her words were broken yet soft even though he couldn't hear or decipher them. Charlie closed his eyes so he could float on his back. He was in the sea of Ava. He was riding her waves, being pulled all of her currents. "Charlie, come for me…"

Charlie moaned again, the sound coming from a place nobody had unlocked but her. Ava's rode him as he continued to float into a slow churning whirlpool. He was spinning, unable to breathe, or think. Charlie felt down in the depths of her whirlpool but he wasn't scared. It spun faster until he felt himself being pushed up again. He couldn't see the surface, Ava above her. He was rising, rising, rising, slowly rising to meet her. When he finally did, Charlie opened his eyes and released into her again, making her collapse on him in satisfaction as sweat glistening on them both.

"Thank you…" Ava said, breathless and comfortable on top of him. "Thank you…"

—

Ava's stomach growled against him and she bit her bottom lip, blushing.

"Sorry," she said, with a laugh. "Guess I have an appetite after the great sex we just had. Did you know that sex burns about 300 calories?"

Charlie raised his eyebrows in playful surprise.

"Is that right, Future Dr. Rayburn?"

"Yep," Ava answered, popping the p, and sat up, holding his sheets around her. She tousled her hair and her stomach growled again. "Seriously, I am hungry. And those appetizers at Michael Baldwin's retirement party – which we're expected to go to tonight for some reason – are going to be crap on a platter."

"Alright," Charlie agreed and kissed her before hopping out of bed, in his boxers. "Let's see what edible things my fridge bears. Be back in a bit."

He kissed her again, before exiting with a big smile on his face.

Charlie easily maneuvered the stairs with – as cliché as it was – a bounce in his step. He whistled a happy tune as he turned to head into the kitchen. Charlie froze and then grew panicked and angry when he saw the intruder standing in the entrance to the kitchen. He recognized the grey suit jacket with no tie and left unbuttoned while the rest was all black down the shoes. Something clenched his stomach as the intruder raised an eyebrow at him in silent inquiry, hands easily buried in his pockets. There was an ease about him.

"Uncle Malcolm," Charlie whispered, looking up to see if Ava was coming. Thankfully, she wasn't. "What are you doing here?"

"Here to give you an out, nephew."

Charlie frowned, with a sigh, rubbing his head in exasperation.

"You and I both know I don't want an out. You're the one who keeps saying there isn't one when it comes to this line of work."

"You're family. Exception to the rule."

Malcolm surveyed him quietly and then after a pause, and gestured upstairs. Charlie stood there with only Ava in his head and the ghost of Ava in his arms. He waited so long to have her now he did.

"Your girl seems like a sweet, young lady."

Charlie narrowed his eyes at his Uncle Malcolm and said with a set jaw. "Ava isn't involved. She's separate from all this, man."

His great-uncle laughed quietly and shook his head.

"Damn. You still don't get it. You can't separate the two, son. You're damn good. This life runs through your veins. It's in your blood. Maybe it was destined to find you. I mean, shit, one day when I'm not here, you'll be head of this organization. I trust you that much. You've got us aligned with our friends Down Under."

"As long as Caleb remains locked up in that maximum security prison in Tasmania, the deal will hold. He's a liability. Even they know that to be a fact. They'd be stupid to entertain otherwise," Charlie explained, smoothly as if telling someone the weather when asked. Charlie knew only of his uncle, his father's identical twin, through stories his father didn't want to tell him or Mattie. He never quite got to hear the ending from him and that was something Charlie had to live with.

Malcolm gazed at him in something like pride. "That's just it, Charlie. You've planned everything to the last detail. You're strategic. You're loyal to me and I'll never forget it. They only agreed because they respect your old man and respected grandfather, but still, your potential is limitless," Malcolm said, with a soft smile on his lips. Charlie watched the smile disappear as quickly as it came. "You have a taste – a gift – for the business, but here is what it comes down to. You can't have Ava and be in this life. You have to make a choice, Charlie."

The lump in his throat was painful to swallow. He glanced down and then glanced upstairs, thinking of the person he was or what he could choose to be. He was Charlie, the all-around good kid with no enemies. He went to school, lived his life and now, he had Ava. As his uncle's second-in-command, however, he was learning so much about the business. Charlie was finding his own style his own stride. It was being the good guy that also made him very dangerous. It was intoxicating, but nobody ever thought of the word, dangerous when thinking of him. His head pounded and he sighed in exasperation.

"I can have both, Uncle Malcolm," Charlie reiterated, defiantly. "I can handle shit and still be with Ava. I'm not going to choose."

The older man grinned and clapped him good-naturedly on the shoulder.

"You have balls, son. That's why I love you and that's why you can navigate this so well. Because I love you, I'm giving you an out. This world is not as glamorous as it's made out to be. It's a messed up place. People will die around you and because of you," Malcolm said, grimly. "Go to school and finish your education. Have a life. Be a normal dude. Have fun and explore. Build a legitimate career. Have a life with Ava if that's what you want."

"Uncle Malcolm, you can't do this now—"

Malcolm's eyes flashed with a certain conviction and truth that scared Charlie because it was true. He felt that sensation every day. Charlie felt some piece of himself break and disappear little by little, but here he stood, the all-around god guy – the brother, the son, the steady friend, the boyfriend.

"Now is the right time. I've already hurt your mama and spit on your grandma's memory because this life destroyed her until there was nothing left of her and my own brother to this day, hasn't forgiven me for it. I love your Aunt Liv. I like to think that God made me love a healer so I can be reminded that I destroy. She sees people broken and bleeding every day, all day and in that time, I worry that she will be the one in that bed because of me. Nate's a doctor like his mama, making something good come from my name so I can be grateful there. She's a good woman and I don't know what I did to deserve her but Dru was my match on every possible level. She understood me in ways no one else could," Malcolm remembered, with a sadness in his tone. Just like that, he hardened up again and kept speaking. "I'm asking you to see reason. You know that? I'm not asking. I'm _telling_ you. Fall back. Let this go, please."

He shrugged, food long forgotten although Ava never was.

"No. It was my choice. Nobody forced me. I chose to join you. I chose to work up the ranks. I chose to stay. You can't apply logic to something like free will," he argued back. "You can't tell me anything. I'm not out."

Malcolm sighed again, moving to walk away.

"I've fucked up in the worst way by _letting_ you choose this life. This life will wear you down, grab you, and choke the soul out of you. It will erode every part of you until you're truly a monster," Malcolm told him and Charlie did everything to ignore the chill that ran up his back and the renewed rattling in his chest. The circumstance didn't chill him, but his response did.

Charlie replied, matter-of-fact, "I want that monster. My girl's not a factor."

"Like I said, Charlie, it's up to you. Figure it out for her sake and hers."

Charlie watched Malcolm walk out of the kitchen and through the door, and closed his eyes when it closed shut. He sighed, shakily, rubbing his face. Suddenly, Charlie didn't have an appetite for much of anything. Nausea slowly reached out to grip him. Anger crept his hands and he itched to punch something.

"Charlie?" a soft voice said from behind and he whipped around. There Ava was, blonde hair all wild and free as one of his shirts hung off her body but showed off her curves and long legs. She walked over to him, green eyes searching his and brows furrowed together in confusion. She touched him, and Charlie forced himself not to flinch. Not because he didn't want her to touch him. God, he did. It was because of what it now symbolized. What he could lose. He looked at her, touching her face. She gently put her hand on top of his. "Hey, what's wrong? I thought we were going to get something to eat."

"I don't…I don't want anything," Charlie replied, honestly because it was the truth. He gently pulled her in, kissed her forehead and held her in his arms. "I want you."

He could feel Ava's head against him and her smile. She looked up at him and grinned.

"You've got me," Ava said, softly and kissed him. "I'm not going anywhere."

 _This life will wear you down, grab you, and choke the soul out of you. It will erode every part of you until you're truly a monster._

Charlie hoped he didn't go anywhere. He wouldn't let himself go, or Ava. He couldn't.

* * *

 **lucy romalotti**

Lucy stormed out Johnny's apartment and punched the elevator button to go down. She grew impatient, and pressed it some more as it would force the elevator system to work a little harder. Of course, she knew it was fruitless but Lucy needed to do anything to stop her agitation. Her nausea was enough. Thankfully, some higher power heard her prayers and the silver elevator doors opened. Lucy stepped into with shaky feet and she took breaths in and out, resting a hand on the mirrored glass surrounding her. She couldn't breathe and didn't know how she managed to fly all the way from Bali back to Genoa City, she didn't know. She had come back for him. She had come back for Moses. Just him. Lucy felt Johnny's web under her skin and desperately wanted it out. _But do you really, Lucy?_ Johnny's rough voice whispered near her ear and rattled her brain.

—

Bali was her refuge, her safe haven, and a photographer's dream. Lucy could walk along the beaches with the sand between her feet and waves splashing around her ankles. The only thing she had was her camera. Lucy could brandish it and capture things to freeze them forever. She captured the perfect moment where sea and sky met. Lucy walked through Bali and around it to capture village people as they had little nothing to survive but were extraordinary in their resilience. She looked up and captured centuries-old Buddhist temples, monks draped in orange. Some walked around, others had conversations, and some sat crossed and hands folded immersed in prayers on the way to reaching nirvana. Part of her felt as though she were interrupting something sacred but her photographer's eye took pieces of it anyway. With a satchel, a camera and odd forms of transportation from another to another, Lucy's steps pushed her forward with every zoom of the lens, every flash of light and focused line of sight to get the perfect scope.

Lucy walked until she found herself at an orphanage. Surprisingly, the orphanage director spoke English fluently and was kind enough to let her take pictures for her portfolio. When she wasn't taking pictures, she was watching the children play at a normal pace in bright technicolour. The children had no parents. Some of no family because of one sad, tragic circumstance. Lucy held a sleeping baby girl in her arms who had been given to the orphanage because she was a girl, instead of the son needed to carry on the traditional family name. She couldn't fathom how anyone could throw away this precious thing.

The older ones smiled and laughed. They crowded around her, pointing at her camera. They wanted to know what it was and they laughed and clapped when she took pictures of them. But there was child, a little boy that somehow stuck to her. He was quiet and shy with a round face and chubby cheeks but he had the most beautiful dark eyes she had ever seen. He always found her and when he did, he smiled and found a way to hold her hand. When Lucy sat down, he crawled into her lap and stared at her in wonder and part curiosity.

The orphan director smiled and said in accented English, "He likes you very much. But he also likes your hair because it is so red. He has never seen it on anyone before."

Lucy laughed and let him touch the ends of her hair. He was tentative and unsure, but she gently told him it was okay, he finally touched it and said something she didn't quite understand. Lucy looked at the orphan director with amused questioning.

"He says your hair is like fire," she clarified and Lucy stroked his cheek, amused by his penchant of finding things to be enthralled by.

Children were innocent that way, and she wasn't. Her life stopped being simple and Lucy couldn't get back to it. Her mother had died in an institution for the criminally insane and Lucy felt nothing. How could she feel anything for a woman she had no connection to, other than blood? She had her mother's mouth, her ears and definitely the red hair but that was it. Her dad was back in Georgia after moving back to Genoa City with her and Heather at sixteen. She chose to stay in her dad's old loft apartment with him paying the rent provided she find a way to pull her a weight. So, Lucy did. Lucy started with painting and shifted over to photography until she became an intern behind the camera on movie sets.

That's when at seventeen she met Johnny Abbott all over again, not as childhood buddies bound by playdates mandated by their parents. She met Johnny as a man who shined like the blinding supernova onscreen and was in the throes of becoming a black hole that consumed them both when the cameras stopped rolling.

—

When Lucy had sex with Johnny, they never had deep meaningful talks afterward. Lucy never lay in his arms and listened to his heartbeat. They never said those three words. There were never soft touches or gentle caresses. Sex was rough. Always. He grabbed at her underwear and tore it to shreds, his dick buried so deeply inside of her it could have been another appendage of her body. In some twisted, sick way, it was. Lucy ripped his expensive dress shirt open, buttons falling everywhere. He grew angry and kissed her so hard, her button lip might have bled. In her explosive anger, she pulled him into her roughly and clawed at his back with the same kind of roughness.

Johnny pounded into her so hard, dark purple bruises stood out against her pale skin. In turn, Lucy pulled his immaculately done blond hair back for full access to his throat. She wrapped her fingers in his immaculately blonde hair, sucking and biting so hard, he laughed delirious with the pain and the hickeys slowly appeared. She learned to stop being angry when other women called him when unnamed, faceless women fell into his bed or strippers draped themselves all over him while they were lined and stuffed with his money. Lucy only stopped being angry. In fact, she anticipated it, making Johnny suffer for it when playing the game only they knew the rules to.

Johnny scorched her abdomen with intense kisses, biting the inside of her thigh and twisting her clit with his tongue so quickly everything moved in a blur for her. He twisted her into a pretzel that hardened and broke under his roughness. Johnny took in her wetness. She held onto his hardened dick, gripping it a little painfully before she started to suck painfully slow in the beginning. Johnny grunted, eyes shut and called her a teasing little bitch, shuddering under her. Lucy felt a powerful kind of satisfaction thrum inside of her as she sped up a little more and his breathing became slightly shallow but he managed to say _fuck you, Luce_ over the hissing of their torrential downpour.

Lucy sucked again, a little faster and finally, she felt it. She felt Johnny explode hot and fast in the back of her throat and on her tongue. She took everything. Lucy consumed everything as he yanked her red hair and pushed her deeper into his penis, allowing her to take all of him. Johnny cried out and swore one last time, as came. More of him to take. More of him for her to keep and take all at once. Everything just short of whatever remnants of his soul remained there.

Then it was over. Lucy was left in the aftershocks of Johnny's earthquakes. Afterward, it was a pattern of him lighting a cigarette and smoking it. Then he would expertly kiss her with a mouthful of cigarette smoke, blow into her mouth and they'd blow it out together at the same time. Other times, Lucy would sit in his lap, fingering a fresh hickey she's got him while taking a hit of his blunt before he took it from her and smoked himself. Sometimes, Lucy would wear the discarded dress shirt, fingering the long, red welts on his back she'd given him while he bent to do a line cut with a shiny credit card on his glass center table. She saw his darkness. It was like a black electric eel. It swam deep underneath in the crimson sea of his blood, propelled by his heartbeat. Lucy could hear the eel hiss and breathe as it gained length and speed bit by bit. It swam up the back of Johnny's muscular arm across the surface of his back and swam back down the other arm. It was mesmerizing. She came around and straddled his lips and Johnny was staring up at her. That gold vial of coke hung around his neck like an Olympic gold medal and Lucy fingered it. She stared into those his eyes and saw that dark eel looking back at her, giving bright blue electric sparks. They were that sharp, light blue colour – the same as his eyes.

"You, John Abbott IV, are the devil," Lucy said, seriously, hands playing with the blond hair at the nape of his neck. He smiled, one of half cruelty and amusement and removing one of her hands, kissed her wrist.

He was. She believed that but she also believed that he acted that way because it was a feature film starring him and is his favourite script to memorize. One of her favourite photographs still stayed undeveloped. It was after sex day and like normal, they said nothing to each other. They stayed in the penthouse apartment in that silence. Lucy remembered only because she had brought her camera the night before. After sex, Lucy wore one of the highly priced shirts discarded on the floor. Her red hair was tousled, and although, it wasn't a chilly day, goosebumps grew on her skin. She wanted to capture the space and freeze it.

Johnny had wondered away from her shirtless, his ass beautiful in his boxers and his White Gold Rolex back on his wrist. It was his favourite, not because it was expensive but because it was a birthday gift from his mother. He wondered away from her and in that time, had a drink in his window but didn't drink it. Instead, Lucy watched him stare out the window. What transfixed him, she didn't know. A lock of his blonde hair fell in his face, loose and streams of hit it. His face – rather his profile – was chiseled and hard with lines and definition that allowed shading and shadows to emerge. So, Lucy picked up her camera, held her breath and in tandem with a quiet exhale caught the contrast of darkness and light.

Lucy sat there, straddled in his lap there still and smiled at the memory. Rather, it was what she had caught that made her smile as she stroked his face. The scent of his aftershave still assaulted her. She caught a rarity. She had a diamond in Johnny Abbott's roughness. Lucy could still see the blue eyes of that dark eel as it could swim inside of him, and wrap itself around parts of him tightly in the six pack of his abdomen now. Yet, in that photograph, Lucy had captured Johnny's halo. He was an angel, too and that was too precious for her to develop much less show it to the world. It was Lucy's internal gallery. That one photograph hung there against the expanse of the bare, stark white walls and that was enough.

"Hades had Persephone and took her for himself," he replied, smoothly and grabbed her hips where fresh bruises caused by him resided. "You, Lucy Romalotti, are my Persephone."

—

The bile crept up her throat as Lucy took deep breaths and willed herself to take one deep breath after the other. When she inhaled, Lucy took a step with her left foot. When she exhaled, she took another step with her right. The cool air hit her skin, despite feeling like she would erupt from the heat churning inside of her. Lucy didn't remember the door man opening the door for her. Lucy didn't remember politely throwing a mundane thank you. She didn't focus on hoping Moses would call her and take her up on her offer to meet up at Crimson Lights so they could talk. Lucy forced herself to not focus on Hades taking Persephone away to be his underworld queen. Lucy didn't want to think about think about the beautiful dysfunction Johnny drowned her in and she chose to soak in. She only had the laser sight of her camera, zooming in as she saw her car getting closer and closer to her. Her stomach churned and Lucy still had to breathe. She still had to concentrate on breathing.

Lucy finally made it all the way to her car, pointing the fob at it so it beeped twice and slid into the driver's side. Placing her hands on the smooth steering wheel, Lucy rested her head on it and took deep breaths. Lucy willed her brain not focus on the sweet, good-hearted man who was so gentle with her, she cried. She didn't want to think about the gentle hands that ran themselves through her hands and caressed her curves. Lucy didn't want to think of Moses and feeling bits and pieces of his soul on paper in his spoken word poetry before on printed them on her skin. When she had sex with Moses, it was different. It was never just sex. He always said he loved her, but never pushed her to say it back. _Some people aren't ready for something intense like that. You're not and I can't push you. Just thought you should know how I feel on my end. I do love you, Lucy._ Lucy couldn't bear to think of the soft kisses he pressed against every bruise Johnny gave to make her his.

She didn't want to think about the spark of darkness that resided, twisted and slipped through every crevice of Johnny's being. Lucy didn't want to think of Moses' soul and the way pure, blinding light shined bright and found a home in his heart. Lucy cried when she thought of the way she craved Johnny's pain, rough hands, kisses that let her come undone and his rough hands. She cried, nearly sobbing when she found sanity in Moses' gentle hands, kisses that felt like one of her deeply buried prayers had been received and answered. Johnny were opposites that left in the middle. They left twisting, floating and unable to breathe. One held her heart wrapped in razor wire and squeezed it as it beat, a bloody mess. The other held her heart of glass regardless of the potential for him to be cut by the jagged edges and to fear its dark center.

Most of all, Lucy would never forget the one night she fell and stopped being Moses' bright dancing flame intertwined with stars in the sky. Instead, Lucy dove into the familiar darkness. Like two shadows that collided and became as one, Lucy became the Nancy to Johnny's Sid Vicious.

Persephone had gone to her Hades willingly. The queen had gone to find her king and when she finally did, their dance in the depths of the underworld began again.

—

Lucy sobbed, tears misting her vision and when she couldn't hold back anything, her nausea overpowered her. Thoughts of Johnny and Moses swirled in her head and their hands of hot and cold grabbed at her. She was falling somewhere strange. She was screaming but Lucy couldn't hear anything. Lucy felt gazes from every angle on her but she was stumbling around in the dark for any kind of clarity. Finally, Lucy gave up fighting and let herself run out of her car. She permitted herself to run and let herself vomit, retching and heaving two parking spots away from her car.

—

Lucy rinsed her mouth with a handful of water in Crimson Lights' bathroom. She sighed and exhaled as she splashed cold water on her face. She pulled a sheet of paper towel and patted her face dry. Her make-up didn't matter as much as the cool water felt on her skin did. Lucy heard ginger was good for settling nausea. She had been dealing with this, even while in Bali, drinking cups of natural herbal teas. Sometimes, it stemmed the nausea and other times, it made it worse. Lucy looked at herself in the mirror, adjusting her red hair. She grabbed her purse and walked out of the bathroom, turning the corner to get to the counter.

The blonde barista – Lucy noted her name was Tiffany – smelled and greeted her.

"Um, can I get a ginger tea?"

"Sure!" Tiffany chirped and went away to get her tea. "What's your name?"

"Lucy," she answered, politely and Tiffany nodded, returning to her work. She tapped a nail painted light blue on the counter absentmindedly, breathing to keep any recurring nausea away. She wondered how long she was going to have to deal with it. In her quietest thoughts, Lucy's mind unwrapped another possibility like a prettily wrapped box with a sparkling bow. It was beautiful but she could possibly unwrap it and unleash a kind of Pandora's Box that would affect for the rest of her life.

Tiffany's high voice brought Lucy back into Crimson Lights and pushed away from the sparkling present in the dark. She blinked and then offers a polite smile and the barista presented her with relief in in a portable cup.

"Oh, um… thank you," Lucy said once more and slid Tiffany a five from her purse. "Keep the change. She turned around and walked to find a seat so she could hope, wait, and then hope some more. When she took the first one, Lucy stopped. There he was. There was Moses. He sat in a booth, staring into his mug. Lucy stared as his broad shoulders were slumped, forehead creased in thought. The dark eyes usually happy and sparkling had a faraway, distant look in them. She almost turned away and headed to the door.

"You asked me to show up, I did," Moses' voice sounded, the words hit her in the back. They landed in her heart like knives. Lucy turned around, her eyes meeting Moses' hurt, angry ones. "You're actually back?"

"Yeah," Lucy glanced down. "I didn't think you would actually show up."

Moses leaned back in his booth seat, gesturing for her to sit. When she sat, she saw that he had a new hardness about him. He brought his cup to his lips with one hand, took a mouthful of coffee and set it back down. He laughed quietly and sardonically.

"If I didn't want to show up, I'd still be in the middle of playing with Katie's clit."

Lucy tried to hide her sharp intake of breath, and exhaled, resting a hand on her abdomen to settle it. She smiled, wryly to disguise her hurt. "Fine, I'll let you have that one."

Moses' head snapped up and he narrowed his eyes.

"You'll _let_ me have it?" Moses sneered, with a simmering anger. Lucy realized the distance between Genoa City and Bali did nothing to heal the heart she broke. She blew the top of her ginger tea and took a sip. It was sweet on her tongue with undertones of spiciness that hit the back of her throat when she swallowed. "What? Like you let me _have_ you after you _had_ Abbott?"

Lucy felt her own anger and annoyance slowly start as warmth in her center and spread out white-hot all the way to her fingertips. She could feel her head, pounding, as she tried not to scream, cry or do both at the same time. Her emotions seemed to be out of order and their different contexts were shifting like an infinite number of puzzle pieces. Lucy's emotional puzzle was so wide, the pieces small and seemed impossible to assemble.

"I told you," Lucy said, slowly, letting the heat of her tea warm her palms until they nearly burned. She would have rather burned on the outside because the heat inside was compressed with no outlet. It was hotter and felt like though Lucy swallowed the sun and couldn't get rid of it if she even tried. Lucy's gaze locked with Moses' cold one. "I came back from Bali for _you._ I came back to Genoa City because I want to be with _you_. What I did with Johnny hurt you, but I'm here to make amends. I let Johnny know we were done."

"He doesn't know the concept of done. He doesn't understand it, and he doesn't understand you."

"Funny. He said the same about you," Lucy retorted under her breath and instantly, regret crept up her throat instead of the bile and vomit from earlier tonight.

Moses stared at her as if she were a stranger like she had spoken a new language he didn't understand or as if she had spoken in reverse when everything else travelled forward. He then cursed and laughed. It was a bitter sound Lucy had never heard before. He hit his fist against the table with restrained anger. The force and the sound of his cup rattling against it made her jump, and other patrons to look around. It didn't seem to have any effect on him though. Moses wasn't with his light anymore but it separated from him and grew dim.

"I didn't mean that."

"Yes, you did and it's fine. I _don't_ understand you. You confuse me. You frustrate me. That's the only truthful shit here right now. That son of a—" he started and stopped himself, the pain in his eyes magnified when he looked at her again. He looked away from her and his shoulders became slumped again. Lucy ran a hand through her hair, not sure where that had come from. Brown eyes bored into her. "Where were you when you called me?"

Lucy grew quiet as her ginger tea went from hot to warm. She watched Moses lean back and drink his coffee. She took a sip of her ginger tea to fill the silence. No doubt her tea was as bitter as his coffee. Her hands shook and she put them in her lap to hide them. Moses raised an eyebrow. Lucy's eyes filled up with tears. No, she never could hide anything from him.

"Where were you, Lucy? Simple question."

A tear slid down her cheek, and she brought a hand to her cheek to whip it away.

"I was at Johnny's," she admitted, quietly. Lucy then said it louder because it was a fact. One didn't want to deal with. It was one that dug itself in her brain and slithered itself down her spine. It churned in her abdomen and again, her hand found a way to rest there. For some reason, Lucy couldn't comprehend, she felt a small current of fear there. "You want honesty, fine. I was there. Of my free will. Nobody put a gun to my head."

Moses swore in irritation and stood up. He went into his back pocket and threw down a five before looking at her again. The hardness still new to her settled back in his eyes. Would he ever lose it? She hoped. God, she hoped.

"I was better off putting my dick in Katie's ass."

"Are you saying you actually did that?"

"Yes," he answered, bluntly. "Because I'm doing you the courtesy of telling you the truth."

She watched Moses start to storm off, but Lucy wouldn't let him. She left her tea because it wasn't needed. The nausea was replaced with urgency. She grabbed her purse and took it. Lucy hoped this talk would produce a beautiful photograph, emanating the sense of starting over. But the photograph unraveling in her mental photograph stayed on low quality film with unusable negatives. Lucy put those in a mental dark room, never to be developed or seen.

Lucy took long strides to get to him and when she did reach the patio, she grabbed his muscular arm and turned him around.

"Condemn for Johnny but I'm not the only one neck deep – or rather, pussy deep – in Abbott charm or dark magic…or whatever the hell you want to call it," Lucy replied with a sharpness in her tone she didn't regret. She held her clutch, tighter than normal and pinned him with a glare of her own. She felt a pair of eyes, invading the tense fishbowl she found herself with Moses. She glanced over to her left to see a brunette woman with square-shaped black frames, stirring her coffee not so discreetly. Lucy paused to narrow her eyes at her. "Use those legs to walk away before I throw your coffee in your fucking face!"

Moses raised his eyes when Lucy focused her attention back on him.

"She's using you."

"So?"

"She'll kill you. _You're_ wrapped up in her."

He shrugged, "Let her kill me. I _want_ her to kill me. I have been wrapped in her since preschool. She took my everything. That girl has shattered me and put me put together. Maybe I want her to be a semi-human for once and maybe she listen to me. I don't know. It's her life. Maybe I let her ride my dick so hard I can't feel anything but _her_ darkness, _her_ fears, fall into _her_ rabbit hole to get a glimpse of _her_ nightmares and see shadows dance against her pale, flawless skin because my own emotions hurt more than I can bear. Who says she's using me, Lucy? Maybe I'm using her. Maybe it's a relationship where we feed off each other or maybe we're just two people who eclipse the other. Maybe some kind of light in me balances some darkness nestled inside of her—"

"Stop it."

"—or perhaps, maybe in her own way, she loves me like I love her. She's not with me in terms of her heart, and I don't want her that way. We're not about that kind of love. Never have been," he continued, with a mocking smile that looked disturbingly comfortable on his face.

"Moses, please…"

"My heart isn't with her. She can't hurt me in any way that matters. She can't rip my heart out and tear it to pieces to the point to where I can't breathe. Katie can't fuck with me and run away. She can't make me miss her to the point to where I drink and give myself alcohol poisoning. The day after I had alcohol poisoning, she slit her wrists just so we could be in the hospital together. I called her insane for letting her mom find her bleeding out on the bathroom floor. You know what she did?" Moses laughed, wrapped in some memory precious to him. Lucy almost found herself jealous. "She rolled her eyes, told me fuck off and dragged me off because she wanted to sneak into the psych ward floor. She wanted to say hi to her people and get us high on their meds because we were already patients and her Newman and Abbott families pay for the hospital. _They all work for me, Mo._ That was her reasoning. She can't turn my poetry dark. Katie can't hurt me so badly I only find reasons to be normal because of ecstasy. I tried it for the first time and hated it, but there Katie was. There to make me chemically happy. There to give me her body so I could take my rage and pain out on it," Moses finished sadly and spoke softly, the smile disappearing. "Is it messed up? Yes. It's beyond twisted and dysfunctional. But it's… she's there. Katie's always there."

Lucy watched the smile disappear from his face and he was back to being the man she did love. Still did love. She went to touch his arm and he gently moved back.

"Johnny's right and I hate that I even have to say that," Moses said, after a short pause. He set his jaw and she saw a mantle of tension on him only Johnny could trigger. "My love and affection for Katie is the reason that piece of shit still stands and draws breath. But he's right. He… He will always have a hold on you. Johnny _has_ you. Your heart, your soul and literally, your body because he's marked you. He has parts of you I can't begin to touch."

"He doesn't…" Lucy protested, and it sounded weak to her ears. "He doesn't have anything."

Moses' eyes finally glistened with tears as he reached out and stroked her face. His hand felt soft and soothing to her soul and she couldn't lose that. He was her calm in the eye of the storm and her parachute when she tumbled with no safe place to land. Yet Lucy had to admit that, she loved Johnny. Johnny was there. He never really left her, and yes, she did always come back because she wanted to, and because, in his own way, he loved her. Moses was her spring and her summer, warmth bringing parts of her to life. Johnny was her autumn and winter. Johnny killed her. He broke her when she wanted to be broken. He put his claws in her and anchored himself. He drained her of her colour when she wanted to see in grayscale tones of black and white. Johnny was her winter, his hands cool but painful like frostbite. His fingers were ghostly on her body. His fingers were quick, navigating the blueprint they had forged. He took those fingers and stuck them into her.

"You're so wet for me, Luce… I told you're mine.," Johnny said, eyes blazing as she arched her back because of the cold, sharp snowflakes scrapping against each other in her abdomen. "All mine. Like I'm all yours. I will never let you go and you will never let me go."

"Holy fuck. I hate you," she breathed, nearly screaming. "I hate…you, Johnny."

"No, you...don't," he answered, roughly as he kissed her abdomen. Lucy inhaled sharply as he went downward and as always, found her center. Johnny found that pink center and froze her inside with his tongue. With every quick movement, she felt her stomach acid freeze, felt her blood slowing down in flow and her heart stop.

Lucy stroked his hair with his face still between her thighs. She parted her legs to give him more access to his winter snow as it built in a white-out a blizzard. She remembered the story. She remembered the Greek story rooted in its mythology. Lucy remembered the reality of it even the status quo of that legend was warped and twisted around.

She was Persephone being dragged down by Hades to be in a subzero snowstorm while being pulled above ground to meet Apollo's bright flowers and sunshine.

—

Moses was leaving her. He removed his hand finally.

"I love you, Lucy. That's all I know. But I can't go against something bigger than you and me. Johnny has every part of you right down to your soul. You won't take it back from him. You're in this vacuum with him and there's no room for anyone else. It's just the two of you, blowing and twisting around it. For reasons beyond me, that dark space is where you want to be and I have to move away before I lose my mind and suffocate," Moses said and then his eyes implored her. "Please let go of what tiny piece of me you have. Let go of me."

"I can't… I don't want to. Don't—don't…make me."

Moses finally let a tear fall on his cheek and Lucy watched his Adam's apple bob up and down like a buoy in a stormy sea as he swallowed.

"If you ever loved me," he rested a hand on the door to push it and look back to softly smile at her, "you will. This is how it has to be. Goodbye, Lucy."

—

In a moment of uncontrolled rage whether by her newly hyper-magnified emotions or the unfortunate sequence of events leading up to their release, Lucy felt her adrenaline pull at like a dark nameless, faceless puppet master. It told her to search. It told to look her and make her hurt. Lucy heard the warped voice tell her to make Nosy Glasses Girl loudly externally so her own internal screams could be drowned out. She felt her feet push forward toward as that nosy brunette bitch. That stupid little shit could laugh in her conservations while Lucy cried in hers. Somehow, it wasn't fair. Lucy stalked over there, devoid of rationale. The girl stopped in her conversation with her friend and looked up at her with confused eyes.

"I don't know what you want. It was rude of me to do that back there, okay?"

Lucy nodded and spoke in a tone that didn't sound like hers. _Ah, there's my Lucy_ , she heard Johnny's smooth and smug voice in some small burrowed part of her heart.

"Yes. It was," Lucy replied, and picked up the still scalding hot coffee cup. She felt herself peel off the top. She saw the streams and wisps of steam rising from the light brown liquid sweetened by milk and whatever sugar substitute health professionals deemed as healthy. "It really was."

She saw her own wrist tip the coffee cup, the steaming liquid exit its security and fall like a creamy, caffeine saturated waterfall onto its owner's bare thighs. The skin instantly turned an ugly red as Lucy smirked, watching the girl scream. People screamed at her. People shoved at her. The girl's friend swore and screamed that she was a psychotic bitch. The square frames flew from that girl's reddened and tear-soaked face as her skin blistered and other patrons rushed to call for medical attention. Here was Lucy Romalotti standing in the middle of chaos she created to pause her own for a little while. The girl's friend shoved her at her shoulder, screamed in her face that she was nuts and the police would be fucking her ass up when they tossed her behind bars for assault.

Lucy didn't hear it, didn't pull that smirk off her face, and didn't have the effort or energy to get rid of Johnny, looking devastatingly handsome in an all black suit to leave her and her mind alone. The puppeteer was in control now as Lucy felt her fingers curl into a fist. Someone had her camera and her film. Someone was playing with her lens and twisting her zoom all wrong. Clumsy hands damaged her film and destroyed her negatives. Lucy heard Moses' voice somewhere telling her to stop and draw deep lines between right and wrong. But did those things exist or matter when the pain was this intense?

Lucy was a walking Mt. Vesuvius about to burn anyone in Crimson Lights frozen like Pompeii reborn. She merely made a fist and landed it so hard that the girl's nose audibly cracked under its force. Her hands flew to her face and her eyes widened in horror at the thick stream of dark blood flowing face. Some fell on the wooden floor of the coffeehouse and bled into it. Still, Lucy smirked even when the bile re-appeared and began an ascent up her throat. It bile came back like a bad ex-boyfriend who didn't know the concept of _it's over_. She could feel her vision split into doubles, fourths and then blur it. The nausea grabbed her roughly and shook her until she was flopping Raggedy Ann doll.

Lucy felt her legs again, but they were wobbly and heavy. Everyone around her was bleeding. They were bleeding and it peeled the colours away. When the colours become a rainbow soup on the floor, it crept again and saturated back to their previous places of origins. Even as a familiar darkness returned with gravity as its accomplice, Lucy remained smiling and satisfied. It was her turn to hear screams in horror for her in the distance as Lucy gave up and let herself become a heap of red hair and limbs on Crimson Lights' floor.

* * *

 **mattie ashby**

There was a whimsical way about the way Mattie Ashby danced. Dance, in general, was another sense, her sixth one. Dance was another part of her genetic composition. Dance transformed into another invisible heartbeat in between her audible one. The wooden studio floor was cool underneath her feet as she flowed and flew as the music wanted to and the voice intertwined in it commanded her to. She hated tying her curly mane up when dancing, but Mattie did it anyway for practical reasons. She needed full range of movement to balance the music slowly encircling like a thick smoke with the way her body moved through it. Nobody knew that she had flew in from Los Angeles, and for a while, Mattie wanted it that way. Her dance company was touring in Europe and she had decided to forgo it this time. It would have been insane to something normal to pass it up and ignore this neon-lit stepping stone to a soaring dance career.

Mattie was so confident and comfortable in her talents that she knew there would be other opportunities. But there was only one Genoa City. So, Mattie packed up, send goodbye to her roomies who had come out of their weed high to deem her crazy and hopped on the next flight out. She could have stayed in LA. Could have been someone all legitimately and scrub away the dirt of who she was.

When Mattie got home from the airport, she called no one. Mattie didn't call her parents to pick her up. She didn't call her brother to welcome home and ask him what the hell was going on with him because she'd be rattled for a couple days and couldn't figure out the cause. _Twintution_ , they called it. It was a feeling, a blow of soft wind that hit her the wrong way, a quiet startling sensation in her gut that caused her unexpectedly to drop her glass and break it at one point. When something was really bad and couldn't understand why, Mattie sometimes felt Charlie's secrets in her sleep. Mattie merely asked the cab driver to bring her bags home while she'd stay here. She'd get a ride when she was ready to leave. This studio functioned during the day when her mom modeled on weekdays and taught classes her on weekends. Her grandmother was a classically trained ballerina so to honour her, it was the first style Mattie learned professionally before she taught herself the other dance styles.

Today, it was contemporary. There was something about truly dancing with the whole body. Here, she could paint and make art with it. She could be the paint and the paintbrush. The music could give the painting shading, depth and perception. Mattie knew who the canvas was. She knew the canvas was hard, scratchy and dark and stood on a wobbly easel. Still, Mattie painted. Still, Mattie danced. She only stopped when her body told her to and could rest on the hardwood floor. With the hard surface against her back, Mattie could be still outside while she figured how to keep her internal tectonic plates from colliding or _his_ hands from shifting them herself. Getting up and leaning on an elbow, Mattie pulled the hair tie out and shook her hair until it became its usual mane of wild curls. She wanted her hair to expand and breathe.

She remembered when breathing was easier. Mattie remembered when life was simpler. She remembered when her mother was beautiful and her dad was strong and sturdy. Her mother was still beautiful but her inward resentment became more external. Mattie knew her father to still be a sturdy man but she saw her father until he fell and didn't get up again. Matilda remembered when her brother was a goofball when she was serious and full of realism, although she did smile and laugh. She wasn't all work, all the time because there was always some play involved. Always. Mattie remembered her grandmother's ballet slippers. That tight feeling in her chest still lingered. In her mind, Mattie could replay her recurring dream. It was the same one. A chest of black and gold fell with a thud. It was old, and it carried a film of dust and at the same time, it shined as brand new and freshly locked.

Mattie felt herself walk to it as she always did. The steps were tentative, as if on a tightrope. She wore her grandmother's satin ballet slippers but they gradually turned blood red. Mattie's feet will wet in them as if stepping in mud or puddles that overflowed and nowhere else to go. Mattie still forged ahead with liquid steps to get to the chest, not sure of what it contained or wanting to know. But the curiosity compacted itself in her stomach and settled heavy as a cement block. She took a few more steps and finally got to it. Mattie frowned. This part was new. She squinted to see an old wooden lock but before Mattie could feel the surface and see its grain, it fell unlocked.

She knelt and pushed the lid upwards until the chest opened. When Mattie stuck her hand into it, it was dark but soft. Her hands felt the softness but she winced at the sharpness that pricked her palm. It wasn't hard enough to draw blood from her but it felt as though it could have been. Mattie grabbed handfuls of the dark softness. Feathers. Black feathers. Black swan feathers. Mattie's heartbeat went from steady to the slow, pounding bass she felt under her feet when she danced, bathed in artificial rainbows and manufactured noise. Urgency and need filled her and she had to get to all the feathers. Her hands shook and her arms grew tired. Mattie grew frustrated and pulled out feathers under they became an opaque blur.

"Shit…" Mattie cursed, and combed away rebellious curls that had fallen in her face in her quest to find the bottom of the chest. She felt the dampness of sweat more acutely than when she had danced until sanguinary stains from her leeched into the floor. Mattie pulled out two more handfuls of the dark feathers because she negotiated with herself. Mattie said she would and then would pull a couple handfuls and then no more. She would wake or leave here. But was she even asleep? When Maddie took the last fistful of dark swan feathers, she felt a prolonged prick as if a stab wound had been inflicted on her. Mattie, due to the fight or flight reflex, pulled her hand out. Something foreign had invaded her. Mattie knew it was deep enough to feel it shift around in her palm. She hissed through her teeth, inhaling to stem the burning. "Damnit!"

Her hand shook and Mattie watched the black object twist her life line and start to split the love line in half. Rapid drying blood caked around the entry point and new blood gave the thorn a safe enclave to float. When Mattie was eleven, she dislocated her knee. At sixteen, she then tore a hamstring. Both of those injuries were painful but she understood the cause. She stood backing away from the open chest as it slammed shut. Mattie's eyes flitted around for any exit. Any way to escape. She wanted the dance studio, her quiet space and her loudest refuge. She wanted her cocoon of music and choreography. Mattie wanted familiarity. Anything sliver of it.

She wished for the pain to stop and the ability to recognize anything.

Cold hands sprang from the shadows, gripped her arm as her hand bled and turned her around. Mattie's prayers for familiarity had been answered, or they had been rejected.

It depended on the exact time intersected with space.

—

He didn't speak once and yet Mattie could spare the pools of warm brown in his face and read everything like a worn book with a cracked spine. He didn't open his mouth or make sound yet Mattie could navigate the sandy desert floor in between the cactus ready to bury their thorns underneath her skin. Mattie stared at her. She wore a suit of pure white from jacket to pants, black feather resting in his lapel.

"What are you—" Mattie started to ask but was silence when there was a forceful grip on her wrist and she couldn't pull away.

He frowned and raised an eyebrow. _I hurt you. Let me fix it._

Mattie felt the familiarity of her anger. It burned and Mattie didn't want to feel the acidity anymore. "Don't. Don't fix it. Don't fix _me_."

She felt his fingers deft and quick as they worked. Mattie felt the familiar touches of its pads from thumb to pinky. She felt the glide of the fingers across her palm and between her own fingers. Mattie's hands went from being as hot as the sun to being as cold as the dark side of the moon. She looked down at her palm as the pain began to evaporate like the dark smoke that circled around and between his white shoes.

Before time could stretch any wider, he looked up at her with a glint in his brown eyes and a dimpled smile fell on lips she'd kissed in spaces created by them, and for them. He held up a long twisted thorn the length of a sewing needle and shook her hand.

 _I told you I would._

"I see you haven't changed much," Mattie replied, taking her hand back. "Thinking it'll all be okay when it's a shitstorm. I hate you for that."

"You love me more. I can feel it. I feel you."

Mattie pushed her away and her anger came roaring back.

"Stop it, then."

His eyes burned and shined like varnish on freshly sanded wood.

"I can't," he said, quietly but it was loud. It was a vacuum, a sonic boom that left Mattie's ears ringing with all of him, and only him. "You can't either."

That warmth settled behind those oceans again, Mattie's throat was thick with tears. She looked down and tried to push the tears back but failed miserably. Her voice was tearful and broken. Despite herself, Mattie let his hand rest comfortably in his like it had so many times. Mattie wanted to run away from him screaming and hold on to him until they were fused together in ways that went beyond the physical at the same.

Tears collected in his eyes, as he ran the pad of his hand against the apple of her cheek.

"And the lamp-light o'er the streaming throws his shadows on the floor..." he recited to her like he had to her over and over again.

Against everything in her body, Mattie turned her head slightly to kiss his palm. She looked up to meet him with tears in her eyes that misted her vision. Her vision was the epitome of clarity.

"And my soul from out that shadows that lies floating on the floor shall be lifted…" she recited back.

A moment passed from her to him and back. Goosebumps broke out on her skin.

"Nevermore…" they finished together perfectly. Geography couldn't separate her from him, and a small part of her knew that. A small part of her knew it and the other, fought to accept otherwise. For her sanity, Mattie had to fight so she would continue the battle and eventually win the war.

—

Mattie cried out, entrapped in a cycle of white lights, black feathers and smoke. She burned alive, it felt. She was nearly consumed by the flames until she opened her eyes. She was back to being alone. Mattie was back to being in the solitude of her refuge and for a little while, the flames were extinguished.

—

She shot up, heart beating fast as it jumped up in her throat. Mattie tried to settle the rhythm of her heart and breathing at the same time. A distant pain burrowed itself beneath her skin and another shot through her gut so painfully, it physically hurt. Why was it that as much as she used geography for physical distance Mattie couldn't physically separate herself from him? This was compounded by the fact that Mattie knew somewhere deep down that Charlie was in trouble. It was too big for him to handle and so was her despair. It was so heavy that it left her sobbing alone on the hardwood floor of the dance studio she treasured so much.

—

It was raining when Mattie left the dance studio and arrived at her parents' house. Her bags had come there safely, neatly stacked by the door. She knew her mom would be happy to have her crash there – forever, if it were up to her. Mattie could have chosen to stay in her decently sized studio apartment above the dance studio but not yet. Mattie could have chosen something more upscale and would soon since apartment hunting had been in the back of her mind. However, being above the dance studio was nothing a price tag could rest on. It was priceless. There was that and Mattie needed familiarity to hold on to, something idyllic to grasp for dear life. The house was aesthetically the same for the most part but the place shifted and family mementos grew in number and sentimental value.

Mattie's eyes landed on the bright orange couch and she smiled softly. She and Charlie used this very same couch as their own arena. They fought over the remote there to who got to keep the loose change found in between the cushions. Baby pictures were framed still in light pink, and soft blue. Pink for her. Blue for Charlie. Mattie walked over to the mantle where it held her parents' wedding photo from years earlier. Her father was beaming as he gazed down at her mother, radiant in white. Her elegantly styled hair was held together by a diamond hair clip. It seemed to absorb all of her mother's joy and release it to the world.

"This was your grandmother's," her mother had told her with nostalgic fondness and an undercurrent of sadness in her tone. "She wore it when she married your Grandpa Neil. One day when you find someone you truly love, you'll get to wear it and pass it down to your daughter."

Mattie turned the sparkly hairclip to watch the streams of sunlight hit it and cast rainbow patterns on the wall.

"Did you love Dad?"

Her mother paused, glancing at her wedding ring with a quiet sigh.

"I loved him enough to stay married to him."

Mattie understood that but of course, she kept it to herself. She understood loving some parts of a man while hating others. But when he was a complex, living and breathing Rubix Cube with no solution, Mattie had to accepted him as a perfect cube of mismatched smaller squares. Matte knew he loved her in a sincere way that was rare but he loved other things and people in ways that were common. How could she fight against that strong current? How could she wait and hold her breath in the watery silence before she screamed and parted the water in two? Mattie was falling fast, and falling hard as safe and strong as he hands were. Her fingers were cramping against the edge of a cliff she had constructed with him. At least when Mattie eventually did let go, she would pirouette during the descent. Dance was her lifeline, her constant. A bright shining diamond that burst and turned to sand, the grains on her skin.

Mattie turned the family heirloom in her hands gently as if it were the Holy Grail. When she looked at it closer, she saw that the hair clip worn by two generations of Barber women was a mixture of diamonds and tiny, ivory pearls.

"Do you ever think of your mother, Mom?"

Although Mattie had no memory of her grandmother, she felt closer to her sometimes. People said Drucilla Winters was fierce, took no bullshit from anyone but was stunningly gorgeous. She pictured her grandmother with the grace and elegance of a dancer but the determination and grit of a warrior. Mattie thought her mother was a warrior in her own way. After all, Lily Ashby was not only a revered model and fashion critic whose words people seemed to live by, but Mattie as her mother stepped into her own source of power as a tough head of a modeling agency up-and-coming models dreamed of being under. Even so often, Mattie danced with her mother and sometimes, felt her grandmother's ghost there.

The love of dance linked Mattie to someone she didn't know but loved. It was a way to make sure that connection was not severed. All she had were secondhand stories from her mother's mental album.

"I used to. All the time," Lily answered, softly with a smile that contradicted the slowly dimming sparkle in her brown eyes. Mattie likened it to a flame on a candle that twisted in the wind but never blew out. It almost did at times. Her mother sighed and then smiled brightly at Mattie, fingering one of her curls. "I still do. When I see little reminders of her that triggers a memory."

"I wish I could have met her," Mattie admitted finally, handing the family heirloom back to her mother. Lily took it from her and returned it to its nestling place to rest for however many years.

"So do I, Mattie."

—

Here she was. Here was Mattie in the back where she literally and figuratively began her growth although she never did it alone. It was impossible as she was connected to Charlie in a way, understood exclusively by a few people in the world. She exhaled and touched her hair, feeling stubborn raindrops in the curls. A glass of wine sounded right to her at this moment as it always did calm her especially after what had happened in her subconscious. Mattie sank down into the softness of the couch before standing up again to head to the kitchen. She remembered where the wine was and where the glasses were. The dream was still rattling her as she tried to banish it and bury it but couldn't. Before Mattie could try again begrudgingly to decipher the treasure chest, the feathers and what him standing against darkness so thick, she could touch it, the door opened after the distant rattling of the spare key. She had used it and put it back and it made Mattie whip around.

It was him. Her roommate since before they were nothing but heartbeats in a sea only swam by them. Her best friend and toughest contender because he matched it, step for step. There was Charlie standing in the same doorway of a nest they had inhibited as children and flown out of as adults.

—

"Hey."

"Hey," Charlie replied in that short manner as he pulled off his dark brown leather jacket and sat next to her. Mattie pulled her bare feet under her and nursed her white wine. They shared a gaze that was brief but said enough it needed to.

 _It's been forever,_ Charlie's eyes said first.

Mattie smiled wryly, _I know but I know I can't say I'm sorry about that._

Someone had to break the silence. Mattie internally thanked her wine as she sipped it, making that task her brother's responsibility.

"Mom know you're back?"

"She will soon enough. I'll text her," Mattie answered, and smiled at him even though it terrified her to ask him such a common question. "What's been going on with you?"

"Status quo is still the vibe around these parts. Me? I've just been here," he answered, and then beamed. Mattie saw the brother she'd grown up with when he did that. She always did, looking at him but his joy made it more pronounced. It was good to see him happy. "The usual shit with me. But I do have a date with Ava tonight. Some lame thing for Michael Baldwin we have to go to represent the Genoa City families or something. I'm down with any excuse to step out with her. That's why I'm here. Mom texted me to let me know she had a jacket for me to wear."

"Our mother continues to be fierce and using her fashion world pull for good."

"You know," Charlie said, popping an imaginary collar and a grin splitting his face, "your brother is always looking with waves and everything else on point. I'm genetically supposed to."

"Of course… Holy shit, though. Ava's your girlfriend."

Mattie smiled, a surprised look on her face. The circumstances weren't surprising but she was surprised that he had finally pulled the trigger. She took another sip of her wine and set on the coffee table.

"Girlfriend," Charlie marveled, eyes sparkling. "I love that word, Mattie."

"Charlie, you finally told her! I'm so happy for you guys!"

"And it was amazing. Something out of that Nicholas Sparks shit you read in high school. Maybe I can get Moses to drop a sonnet for me?"

"Don't slander my literacy or Moses' poetry. They're both beautiful."

Charlie smirked with a shrug, "It's my duty as your brother to mess with you and Moses said my waves were trash. I earned that right to throw that shade."

Mattie playfully rolled her eyes, and punched his bicep.

"Oh, shut up."

Charlie cried out and cursed as he rubbed the spot she had hit and it made her smile with satisfaction. She really did miss him, but the feelings associated with her Twintuition came back, tenfold and Mattie asked him again. It was no longer her catching up with her brother and playing around. It was her asking because she needed this feeling of impending danger when it came to him to stop. Charlie didn't possibly be in trouble and even he was, he would tell her. There were close enough to play around and act as siblings do, but never close enough to have certain parts of their lives bleed and intertwine. Not anymore. Mattie knew she was a hypocrite because there was her own storm but she could see a tropical storm forming with enough force to be a full out hurricane. It was one that could have her brother standing in the eye of it or feeding it. She didn't know but Mattie was fighting this acid burning in her chest as it spread.

"What's going on with you, though? I'm not asking about the status quo anymore. I'm asking _you_ ," she questioned, emphasizing the last word like she wanted to punch him hard enough. She hoped it one hard to reach the truth. His truth. Instead, Mattie watched Charlie's face slightly harden and slowly put defenses up. He had never done that with her before and she didn't know whether to do stunned or offended on top of being scared to death.

"Guess I could ask you the same question since my gut feeling has been going off too. Twintution is a crazy thing, huh Mattie?"

"It is," Mattie shot back, red wine tasting tart on her tongue. "Always accurate, too."

Just like that, Charlie became her contender in a stalemate and again, he matched her.

—

Mattie stubbornness matched Charlie's steel resolve. That was the downside of being a twin. There was always one the person to see the secret places and even break the hinges of the doors that kept them at bay. That was Charlie for her, but she would seal her doors shut but he safeguarded the hinges of his. It didn't mean Mattie could hear what it was breathing inside.

"Twisting place we live in," Charlie broke first, lowering his gaze. When he looked back at her, Mattie saw something else take up his internal space and caught the tail end of something in his secret place. Mattie saw the tropical storm bloom into a hurricane, and yes, Charlie was rooted to its eye but he was comfortable in it. "I love you to death, Mattie. I would literally die for you, but leave this alone. Don't ask."

"So, there _is_ something."

"Isn't there something with you?"

"Of course, there is," Mattie volleyed, not bothered by Charlie's accusatory tone, or rather, the subtext of one in his voice. "But we're not talking about me."

"You don't get to change the rules."

"I'm not!" Mattie snapped, finally and exhaled, frustrated. "I'm just worried that you're in the middle of something bigger than you. I'm worried about you."

Charlie grew silent and then softened, slightly.

"It's a messed up place we live in. We're not kids. We're not going to get yelled at for not cleaning our rooms, or eating ice cream after we've brushed our teeth. We're not going to get a stern warning for stealing expensive diamonds," Charlie told her, a pointed look and the beginning of a smile on his face. She remembered that childhood memory and it always made her laugh as an adult. He continued. "We're not to get in trouble for breaking curfew or getting drunk at the house party of a kid you don't even fuck with. It's… Darwinian rules are everything here. Strong people survive, and the weak die. That's it."

Charlie grew sad, and so did she because she knew. She knew how close they were but also knew there was a widening canyon splitting between them until they were staring across each other. Mattie knew a time would come when she would be staring across a space from her brother, a hole too dark and deep to pass and get over.

"We have to accept it because we already know. We're not _Charlie and Mattie_."

"No," Mattie agreed, tears pooling in her eyes. One fell no matter how hard to force it back. It traced a wet path down her cheek. She cried for him. She cried for herself, and she cried for the sad realization that she was in the middle of something bigger than herself and wouldn't have her brother in a way she always had. Mattie also cried because she wondered how her life had a chapter in it such as this one. The mental illustration of a simple warm cottage and sunset at Lake Mendota on the edges of Madison was stunning but Mattie didn't want it anymore either. She didn't want this.

"You're the biggest part of me, Mattie, but… Just… I love you. Always."

They were breaking. Mattie felt it and so did he.

"I know. Same here. Always but no," she repeated the word, on a sob as Charlie's eyes had their own sadness in them. Mattie realized he did have their father's eyes that way. "We're not _Charlie and Mattie_ anymore."

—

Mattie Ashby was spawned by two people who were seen as gold, but she stopped glittering. She knew she stopped shining for anyone else years old and only did when in a world of movement and music. That was hers. She stopped glittering when she did too brightly for a man she wasn't supposed to and wanted it all to himself. Charlie had left her, jacket in hand a while ago to go be at this party with Ava. She was happy for him. Truly, she was but she didn't have the energy to blend back into the chaotic ebb and flow of Genoa City. She wanted to dance in the dark again as the bubbles in her head did after her fourth glass of wine. Mattie didn't want to be translucent because it meant she was fragile.

She wiped at fresh tears on her face, and clumsily reached for her phone. She was drunk, and was about to do something stupid. Mattie was about to do something she swore not to. It was her whole reason for leaving for sunny Los Angeles. Mattie forced her eyes to focus on the screen and stop her hands from shaking as she tapped the name and held her breath with every ring. On the fourth blaring of a siren only she heard, he answered. He didn't sound surprised and she hated that.

"I'm drunk dialing you. Why did you make me? I was in California dancing for my life…and now, I'm back here—here. Calling you while you fuck your wife and read your kids bedtime stories," she slurred, pushing herself up on shaky legs that didn't feel like hers. They weren't. The feet didn't belong to her and the nerves of overcooked noodles in them didn't feel like home. Mattie laughed, an errant caramel coloured curl in her face. She balanced herself against the closed door and could feel his eyes on her through the blinds. She stumbled a little. "You're watching me, aren't you? Your people are doing it for you because—because you can do it. You...can do anything to me…"

"Mattie…"

She lost her balance again and slid against the door, sobbing all over again.

"You're in the treasure chest, Luke…"

Her head pounded, her lungs expanded like they held too many of her problems in and they would burst. It was as if the gases inside of them would be released and burn her from the inside out. She was the slow turning ballerina in the open music box and would suffocate her if it closed. There he was opening her music box and then closing it so he could spin and twirl with her to the sound of chimes and bells with her.

"I'll find you."

"You…" Maddie started and sighed, resting her head against the door. It was her dad's warm lap and she smiled against the familiar feeling of his strong hands soothing her. She loved hearing stories of a place that was magical, where everything ran the opposite way and safe in its own corner of the world. Cane Ashby had it in his accent, in his heart, in his soul and she was grateful that Australia was part of her. "You…always do. Don't come find me tonight. Don't find me ever."

Luke laughed, really it was a short chuckle and damn, its warmth. Or, perhaps it was the wine.

"You found _me_ first," he argued, and she pictured that perfect mouth turn into a triumphant smile. Mattie turned her head and through bleary eyes saw the black and gold treasure chest. "Tonight, Mattie. I'll come to you tonight."

Mattie was still drunk, but aware enough to be alarmed. She wished the chest would go away again. The feathers would hurt her again.

"Stay the fuck away from me."

"You don't mean that."

"Yes, I do," Mattie answered, heading swimming and dear God, he was touching her. His fingers. His palms. His skin. His cologne. The cool metal of his wedding ring against her skin and the roughness of his five o'clock shadow against her palms. Oh, God, she was feeling all of it. "Leave me alone. I told…you. You make a real choice or you…get nothing. I'm drunk. I'm fucking drunk. I'm not this mess. You love me… but you made this way. I made myself this way… My brother is different and I love someone I can't… Leave me…alone. Fuck off…"

"I'll leave you alone for a while," Luke promised, finally and Mattie shivered at the quiet conviction. It was strong, powerful and felt as though he was wrapping her in a vice. But Mattie stupidly wanted to stay in that tight embrace. Any kind of his embrace since she could pick which one. "But you can't dance away from me forever. I'll continue to wait for you. When I can't…" his tone was quiet but sure and Mattie bit her lip so hard until she tasted metal because Mattie could see the brown eyes with flecks of amber in the irises. It was almost a whisper. "When I can't wait for you here, I will find you and love all of you like you should. Out in the open, everyone be damned."

Mattie answered, automatically. "It's impossible."

Building her dance career wasn't. It was quite possible and within her sights, Luke wasn't.

"No, it isn't. Because we're here. I want to be, and so do you. Sleep well, my tiny dancer."

—

Her mind tried to spark adrenaline to make herself move and logic to rearrange the jigsaw puzzle pieces. Mattie numbly let the phone fall from her fingers so she could rub the pounding in her head out. The beats were too intricate to follow and she would eventually hit the wrong step and fall. She let his voice drift away with the phone that carried it.

Mattie tried to reach for sobriety. She tried to reach for Australia. She tried to reach for the LA lights and stand in the blinding whiteness of the Hollywood sign. Mattie even tried to find the warmth of the house she lay sprawled in, keeping a thriving party away from her. It was going to be a mess. She knew it and this time, Mattie didn't want to watch it when hers was all consuming. Mattie fought to keep her eyes open. She fought to move forward, and make her feet move to music to drown out the noise.

She was swimming in a sea full of colourful sea, thriving plant life and coral reefs. She was in a dance studio with its wooden floor and sturdy walls which expanded large enough to contain every emotion she let dance with and around her. Mattie was running around this house in a blur of childhood mischief and teenage angst with Charlie at her side until adulthood made him less and less opaque. Mattie was in all of those places but she chose to crash through the walls and demolish the roof of the prominent Governor's Mansion instead and felt no pain.


	4. Prologue: Part IV

**Testosterone Boys & Harlequin Girls**  
 **show:** Young and the Restless  
 **notes:** I thought this was the last part of the prologue, but looking at my outline, it will get far too long if I type out EVERYTHING. Some parts are longer than others because I stopped at crucial moments, I could start the stories I weave together from. There will be a Part 5 and Part 6 and then shit still be tied together. I apologize for the length. But it was needed. I had to cut back what I could, and leave what I couldn't. The next two pages will be named but afterward, they will be normal chapters with no specific POV. It would be too tedious otherwise. Enjoy.  
 **disclaimer:** Nothing is mine, expect the plot.

* * *

 **PROLOGUE  
PART IV**

 **bella fisher**

She didn't look like a girl who would love classical music, but Bella did. Every note. Every instrument flowing in and out of each other. The whole piece was like the human body: a beating heart, expanding and constricting lungs with every inhale and exhale, sensitive nerves that crackled with its own kind of electricity, and the conductor was its guide. The man at the front would use himself to be the heart, pumping blood to make the movements vital and vibrant. With the endorphins from completing another successful experiment on Bree Sanders running rampant still, Bella's smile never left her face. No, Christian would not take it from her. He couldn't. She had witness a blooming of a rare flower and its petals fall before it withered. Beauty was in something like that and Bella would not allow Christian to make it something ugly.

The essence of Bree with its brilliant vermillion was stark against white. She had to. It was still fresh, still wet and smooth. She couldn't resist so Bella made it to make it apart of her. Iron, copper and wine rested on her tongue and sent her into warm oblivion before she burned it until it turned to dark ash. It didn't make logical sense to keep a physical reminder when the physiological, emotional ones was priceless? Bella stood up from her vanity while still in her soft green terrycloth robe. Residual dampness from the steam and water stayed on her skin and turned on the dock charging her cellphone. Hector Belioz's _Symphonie Fantastique_ wafted like intoxicating mist in her room. It steeped through the walls, wove itself through the pages of her books on the shelves. The music sat on her comfortable bedding and melted through the curtains.

Renewed vigor driven with the thrill of the night drove her to finish the bulk of her paper before she was to get ready for Uncle Mikey's retirement party. Sitting back down at her vanity, she caught the reflection of the dress Aunt Lauren had sent for her sitting spread out on the bed. She smirked at the irony of it. Black with shades of dark crimson red. It was a dress she would never wear, but Bella was open to experimenting on others. Why not keep the momentum moving and conducting one of herself? It was a dress that had a black, backless bodice of velvet with dark red skirt that bloomed outward, giving her the opportunity to show off her legs. She turned her gaze back to the mirror and frowned. There was her mother looking back at her through those damn eyes. She saw the pills, saw her mother's madness and saw raw pain that became too acidic for her to bear. Chloe Mitchell swam in it while Bella Fisher floated above it, controlled its flow and marinated in rough, guttural screams when it burned through the layers of skin and made hard bone soft until there was marrow and entrails. She closed her eyes and held on to the fridges of her beloved playground, the legendary murder house brought to life by the tongues of others. It would come down soon but still, she treasured it and always will.

She had brought her barely used wireless hair straightener out and set it on the vanity beside her wide array of makeup. Bella held the silver and black metal straightener in her hands. It felt as cool as her favourite knife in her palms. There was a certain kind of power in bending anything to one's will and making it obedient. She glanced in the mirror again, looking pensive. Surely, she could make her curls behave in the same way and make it straight. So, that is exactly what she did with a little manufactured heat and mechanical force, Bella began phase one of her self-experiment, watching with every sweep of the hair straightener made curly hair fall bone straight to the middle of her back, piece by piece.

—

The murder house on the dark end of a named street not quite remembered still stood, pristine but worn. The body of Bree Sanders lay beneath still wrought with rigor mortis, to be disposed later but there was no time. Later did not exist anymore. A splash of gasoline poured from an old discarded paint can landed on the front, darkened the wooden flooring until the tiny flame of a match grew upwards to consume it the whole structure? It was going to be demolished later so why not let it come down and disintegrate now. A pang of remorse was felt like an unexpected prick of a needle against the skin. The girl was still inside but a quiet resigned sigh escaped into the night air. Perhaps, it was a means to an end but still, there was a curse that followed it but this had to be done. Gloved hands threw the paint can itself into flames that resembled the hell it held inside until it couldn't be seen anymore.

The flames illuminated the sky in oranges and reds and their hot blue center could be visible at if it was stared at hard enough. Eyes calmly stared at wood darkening, brick burning and smoke growing thicker and thicker but it wouldn't reach visibility until the crack of dawn. That was a sure fact. Those eyes glanced upward where smoke twisted to the heavens and then when the house started to come apart and there was a faint undertone of burning flesh, feet moved away back into the dark from which they stepped out of.

—

Bella finished straightening her hair and sighed satisfied as she worked on securing the brown tresses into a high ponytail. She set a black and red ribbon headband on the crown of her head and started working on her makeup. Bella didn't need too much of it. Just enough. She lived by that word. Too much made the task sloppy, while too little made it imperfect. Glancing downward, she screwed the top of her black mascara and something made her smile. She smiled because technicalities were a funny thing, irritating but hilarious nonetheless. She had been using that to tally the number of successful experiments conducting. In a way, the number had been three. Of course, it was three. Bella had pulled three different exotic flowers from her garden and watched their roots shrivel up and die.

There was one plant bigger than the rest. It wasn't a flower at all. No, this one had no petals but rather leaves. It was a tree in the midst of growth. Jesse was a grand tree, growing in the middle of Nadia and Janice's flowers when Bree's flower had barely started to bloom. The trunk was getting bigger and bigger every day as her soil fertilized it. The leaves were turning bright green, photosynthesis doing the job ordained by nature. Flowers were easy to pick up and pick apart. Trees, however, were a lot of difficult to uproot from the ground. It was harder to move its trunk and snapping the delicate branches was lazy. Was it at full height and strength? No. But it made Bella happy to look at every day. It would make her happier to watch it break apart after she let it give her shelter under its cool shade one last time.

She remembered him fondly. Bella did truly like him. She liked him enough to be infatuated by his dark eyes, chocolate coloured skin, how laid back he was in stark contrast to Connor's neuroticism. His smile revealed a dimple in his left cheek. Bella appreciated that he always remembered her favourite flavour of frozen yogurt and gave her a little extra. He was tall and muscular, his frame sturdy. Bella appreciated that about him and when he made fun of how small she was, she took it as being in jest. Sometimes, they flirted even though she loved Connor. She never perceived it as cheating but as one friend interacting in the same way as another. He had told her honestly that he did want her in a way that crossed their friendship but understood she had a boyfriend.

Bella smiled at him, and nudged him reassuringly that day, "Just because you like me that way, you think it will ruin what we already have?"

A confused look came on that angularly structured face and Bella wondered how sharp, defined lines could be bestowed on a soft-hearted, sweet person. He shrugged, "Well, won't it? I feel stupid even telling you knowing you won't reciprocate. I just don't want things getting weird."

Bella shook her head, taking in another spoonful of her favourite peach frozen yogurt and swallowed the cold confection on her tongue.

"Friends are honest, right? That's all I could want from you. We're," she gestured between them, "fine. My boyfriend knows what we are to each other and is fine with it, too. He gets it."

Bella had lied there. Connor was not fine with her friendship with Jesse. It was often a topic they disagreed on and triggered explosive fights between them. Connor argued that she couldn't be so close to that guy. He forbade it not because he wanted to control her but he loved her too much to be the third person in a dynamic that made feel helpless. The word had eight letters in it but the one connotation made him furious to think about, enraged him because of the possibility that it would consume him. _That is what your friendship with him does to me, Bella. It makes feel helpless, not jealous_. The number three was not a number he wanted anywhere in his life, especially when it came to her. It could never touch her or them and he wouldn't allow it. Ever.

Bella had shot back that yes, he liked her that way but she didn't. She argued that Jesse was a good person and she liked his company but damnit, it was always him she loved. _You can't be jealous every time I hang out with him. I love you, Connor. You, my love,_ Bella had continued with a soft laugh against his lips before she kissed them to placate him, _fit me in ways only you can. In ways I want you to. Only you satisfy me._

She loved the boy who sold across frozen yogurt two blocks away from Fenmore's where she worked part-time for her aunt. She wanted him in ways she could keep. So, she did. Bella took him and made him part of her. Not in a conventional way, of course. But still in a way that was equally memorable.

Jesse Lewis was her beautiful sturdy tree and she would take an especially thick branch away from him and treasure it. Then she would split his trunk in half and count all of the faint circles inside with care and curiosity to see what lay inside of him. Bella would seek to find any treasures embedded inside her tree and protecting because only she knew how. So, on a sunny day in May of last year while Connor exploded with the joy of getting to tour the Wharton School of Business in Pennsylvania, Bella would start cutting down her glorious tree while keeping her joy to herself.

—

Abandoned cottages seemed to have the reputation of being bad or scary but this one was just one that needed one soul to appreciate it so she did. It was out far away from Genoa City with woods surrounding it perfect for exploring. Bella didn't flip it or anything but worked to clean it and make it decent enough to reside in when she wanted to get away. Her friends were in Miami for Spring Break, even Christian electing to go with them. She remembered that night vividly. When he had agreed, Johnny Abbott had grinned, clapping him on the back.

"About damn time you fucking lived!" Johnny said, with a laugh and a clap to Christian's shoulder. Bella noticed his eyes glittered like sapphires underneath the club lights. "The strippers in Miami. Nothing like 'em. The cream on the crop when it comes to pussy, ass…everything. I know people. I'll introduce you. Maybe there's one into that quiet, mysterious shit you're on. I don't know."

Christian had looked at his cousin quizzically with slight annoyance. He peeled the hand of his shoulder and dropped it.

"I'm only going with you guys to explore the beach and a change of scenery. I'm not a virgin, Johnny. When I want to have sex with a stranger, I'll handle it."

Perhaps, Christian was a renegade underneath all that quietness but Bella still was unnerved by him and it made her angry and want Connor more and more. He could protect her from him. He would protect her. Christian muttered that he needed a drink and with one more undecipherable look directed at her, he got up from the booth and disappeared into the throng of people engaged in their own kinds of debauchery.

Suddenly, it was just her and Johnny alone in this booth. She did like him enough but she wasn't charmed by him. Maybe the universe had orchestrated this so he could shake her and drown her in his charm. He was an actor used to inhabiting the skin of another person, another character archetype before he took it off and he was _this_. Bella was used to looking underneath the skin so the prospect of an encounter did pique her interest.

Connor had been there before one thing or another had separated the group she blended in. His dad needed him for one thing or another so he left her with four swigs of his bourbon and kissed her with the promise of making it up to her. She merely said okay but discreetly frowned. For someone who didn't like anything in triads, Connor's compulsive need to have his shining moment in the Newman family. It was a wall of flames between them.

He wanted the heavy crown, forged by Victor Newman, on his head. The same crown rested on his aunt, Victoria. She was the woman with the ice in her eyes and the porcelain skin. Next, the crown had rested on his uncle, Nicholas, the man with hard features in his face but a kindness and warmth in his eyes when he smiled. Then the heavy, bedazzled crown had been stolen through trickery by Connor's father before Mr. Newman had built his own hedge fund monarchy.

Mrs. Newman didn't like her all that much despite being a very good friend of her parents: her dad's closest confidante and her mother's best friend once upon a time. She knew that but Bella merely reacted with indifference. Mrs. Newman wanted her nowhere near her sons and stared her with scrutiny while Bella herself, stared at the older woman with a defiant kind of courtesy that only seemed to infuriate her all the more. When Mrs. Newman verbally told her in no uncertain terms to stay away from Connor and Christian, Bella shrugged and calmly told her, "You're their mother. You're protective, but with all due respect, that's for them to decide and I'm quite fond of Connor. Christian and I are friends. Goodnight."

Bella took another sip of her drink and scanned the wide array of people. She saw colours and different auras. There was Katie twirling around in a rainbow of colours. She was enchanted by the movements of a brunette with olive skin before Katie kissed her enclosed in an enclave of music and cocaine with an undertone of ecstasy on the dance floor. Mattie claimed a stripper's pole for herself, dancing on it and around it. She flipped around with grace that was engrained in her dancer's body. She became a ribbon of mocha and caramel curls. Charlie sat at the bar nursing a drink under the weight of a mantle of blood red, his eyes faraway and his face wrought with muted guilt.

Bella noticed his hands as he drained his drink and asked for another. Moses was a drunken shade of sky blue, ascending higher and higher with every recited disjointed stanza of a poem not quite put together while he received a lap dance from a buxom redhead. He stuffed a fifty between her cleavage and kissed her. Bella observed Ava, a sunny yellow, with laughter escaping her lips for one reason for another. She, herself, carried black inside of her and it stayed alive in the essence of her breath and thrived between her heartbeats. Lastly, here was Johnny with his expensive clothes and intoxicating cologne shining a bright, blinding gold. Johnny Abbott would be the shiniest thing she ever collected.

—

It was a Friday night that had somehow morphed into a Saturday morning. Bella had found herself at a club aptly named _Lure_. It seemed to fit because of the number of people that behaved as if they had no free will. It was as they had reached their Promised Land and their land of milk and honey and they celebrated freely. The club life wasn't her scene, but for once, she wanted to shut her brain off for a night.

Johnny met her eye and smirked, questioning her. She stared at him with a raised eyebrow and laughed a quiet amused laugh. They were alone in a dim fishbowl that vibrated against the sound on the outside. Oh, this was going to plenty of fun. Bella scanned her eyes and saw it: different islands of dark vices and uncontrollable impulses. It made her acute aware of hers, curled up itching to be awakened but held at bay. She took a healthy mouthful of the vodka in her glass. "We're alone."

Bella's red lips pulled themselves in a polite smile, her mask of innocence intact. She met his eyes through her long eyelashes.

"It would seem so, Johnny."

He brought his whiskey to his lips and swallowed it, fire and all before setting it down. He turned it absentmindedly, facets of the crystal glass absorbing light.

"I'm just wondering what _you're_ into, Bella. Aside from my cousins."

Bella almost laughed at the irony of that question. She was almost certain he'd fear her if she gave him the truthful answer and she'd tear him apart if she said it out loud. It wasn't allowed to thrive and breathe outside of her, and unattached. It was safe internally because it would wither and die externally. Bella couldn't allow that. She shrugged with a smile. She never would hurt Johnny Abbott. Bella didn't find him all that intriguing despite his devil-may-care disposition and his James Dean looks but he was amusing enough. He was noticeable so he didn't fit the criteria.

At least, his exterior wasn't all that interesting but Bella realized she could be intrigued by the man underneath the script. The club was loud, the music thumping and she thought the closeness of sweaty bodies enslaved by its pulsing was fascinating. It was as close to the human experience as she could get and she wanted to be in the middle of it.

Her index finger with its nail painted a dark, plum purple absentmindedly fiddled with her straw. She crossed her legs underneath the long table, feet in black six inch heels.

"I'm into a lot of things," Bella replied, mysteriously on purpose. "You're the actor between the two of us. I should be questioning what makes _you_ tick."

Johnny's face lit up and he leaned back, surveying her before he laughed. Bella saw his gold getting brighter and brighter and the golden flakes splattered his skin. He looked at her as she dismissed his surprise with a lift of her bare shoulder. She was wrapped in a short, tight little black dress. She shrugged and laughed, too.

He slid closer beside her and Bella could see the flecks of green in those sapphire eyes.

"A lot of things," Johnny replied, lifting her effortlessly into his lap, "make me tick."

"Connor wouldn't appreciate this. He'd hate it."

"And you love it," Johnny brushed a curl behind her double pierced ear. Another stud was embedded in the top cartilage of that ear as well.

"You sound very sure."

"Babe, I'm always sure."

She laughed, feeling the silk material of his tie. "That doesn't surprise me."

He smiled with a shrug, hand traveling to the small of her back.

"Ah, well in any case, my cousin doesn't have to know."

Bella stared down at him, his cologne a thick musk. He always put himself together immaculately, kept his near done hair perfectly and had a wide array of expensive suits. When he was the product of two rich, warring families, Bella proposed there was enough money to spread and even more to spend. She could see him clearly now. She could see his dark heart of black onyx, his blood of gold and his innards of shining, rare jewels. His hands rested on her hip through the fabric of her black dress and it made her smile. Not Johnny touching her while in close quarters but the idea of ripping that vein in his neck apart with her teeth and getting to taste him. Right now, Bella was into wanting that tiny piece of Johnny Abbott that made the rest of him shine outwardly to the world. Bella wanted his fireflies.

She smiled, coyly still holding his gaze, "I think I have an idea of what makes you tick."

"Enlighten me, sweetheart."

She glanced upwards briefly in thought before her arms fell naturally around his neck. Not because she wanted them there because it was a natural physiological reaction. An unintentional placement of the body.

"I think chasing something drives you, Johnny. The idea of wanting something badly enough. The act of chasing it until you can't think, you get obsessive and you crave it so badly," she said, softly, stroking his face, "you'll scream and break yourself to pieces if you don't get it. So, you'll keep running because adrenaline is both your stimulant and your relaxant. Your morphine and your poison. You chase after what you can't have. I chase things, too."

"Which is?" the actor inquired. She could see his interest was piqued.

"Life. I go after life. It's fulfilling enough for me."

"I could chase _you._ "

Chasing her would get him killed. King Midas was going to touch something wrong one day and freeze himself to gold.

"You don't want to do it."

"Suddenly," Johnny's lips quirked into a smile, "you just became my favourite. What's your poison, Fisher?"

She stared at him, studying the features of his face. This was the face that launched a thousand films and set off the high-pitched squeals of fans. This handsome face broke several hearts and crushed some of them to dust. Johnny Abbott. Bella supposed her kind of poison was slow acting, steady and dripped through her until she became numb. Johnny stared at her with eyes that said he wanted her like the others and she very well could indulge him.

Bella was into the human experience, human feelings and emotions even though she lost the ability to trigger anything in herself. She never quite developed it to begin with. She wanted the pure carnal desire. She wanted to inhale his musk and taste him. She wanted him to feel her acidity and wanted him in ways Connor could not provide her. From this debonair, charming man beneath her, she wanted sins of the flesh and wanted to break what was rumored to be unbreakable. Anything could be if one dug deeply enough. Bella wanted to snap him with his renowned brand of carnality. But not today. Never today. Never. Period.

She bit her bottom lip and stared at his mouth. There it was, the gateway to whatever little of his essence she could take. After all, the rest belonged to a redhead with the aura of flames and heat. She didn't know the situation nor did she care but it wasn't a surprise. Lucy Romalotti. Bella still wanted him and damnit, she'd have him. She kissed him and he reciprocated, hand in her hair and his face smooth underneath her palms. He was warm and welcomed her, his tongue in her mouth. He was greedy and meeting him there, she tasted him slowly to savour it. Bella pulled away first and left him stunned. She had the residue of Johnny's honey and ash on her tongue.

Johnny blinked before he realized what had happened. He had stared at her in part wonder and part scrutiny. His face broke out in a smile, taking up his face. He still glowed and the light buzzed under the pad of her thumb when she stroked his cheek. She took her hand away. It was more than she could take.

"Holy shit," he breathed, shaking his head. "Connor has no idea, does he? He has no idea who you really are."

"I don't follow. Idea of what?" Bella questioned, as his hand rested on her thigh and his hand moved higher until his entire hand disappeared under her short dress. "You know what I want, don't you?"

"I know what everyone wants, you minx," Johnny replied, smoothly. "It's always the small innocent ones who are the most wet. You're the most interesting person I've ever met tonight."

"Surely, there's a lap dance or two waiting for you more interesting than me."

"Never."

Her lips pulled into a coy smile.

He removed his fingers from her, satisfied with pieces of her on him.

"You never answered my question."

Bella laughed, a little breathless and nerves still frayed. Ah, Johnny still wanted to know. Johnny still wanted to know that a small part would not have minded breaking the crystal tumbler he drank out of in her grasp. Did he want to know that she could slit his throat and bathe in his golden honey and wear his diamonds as a necklace?

"You think because we happened to share a moment, I'll bear my soul to you? Will you chase that, too?"

She couldn't bear what she didn't have. He shrugged, still holding her in his lap. Bella didn't mind being perched there. She didn't mind it because Johnny was warm and hot blooded.

"Of course. We've gotten close."

"Yes. We certainly have," Bella conceded, staring him in the eyes again. The spun gold of his hair felt like magic between her fingers. "I'd love nothing more than to reveal what make me truly happy. Believe me," she leaned in and traced his bottom lip with her thumb and the double meaning of her next phrase on the tip of her tongue made her smile. "To tell you what makes me tick, Prince Abbott, means that I'd have to kill you."

"Before you go," Johnny started and his eyes glittered again, "hang out with me again."

Bella smiled down at him and kissed him once again. It would be the last time. The last interaction. Last kiss. Last anything.

She was going to be the first girl to say the one word Johnny Abbott hated.

"No," she answered, whispering against his lips and then smirking against them. Bella separated, hands between his face. He was golden and indeed, was bright. "No."

—

Bella slid off Johnny's lap and disappeared into the throng of sweaty bodies, adrenaline and bathed the club in black until she saw no other colour but hers. All hers. Sunny Miami didn't need her and Bella didn't want it. She didn't want the disarray of Spring Break. Instead, she wanted her solitude. She wanted her week away deep in the woods and to nestle under the roof of her little abandoned cottage. Her family understood that and never questioned it. Bella didn't know if it was because they loved her too much to see her or if they were so afraid they didn't want to see her. The cottage was someone's trash and that was okay. Here lay her treasure on her own operation table to be her playground to play in.

Operation had always been her favourite game as a child.

"Thank you, Dad," Bella said to no one as she filled a syringe with the black liquid of a chemical compound she had cooked up in the recesses of GCU biology lab. She returned the small tiny vial to its resting place in her bra and carefully surveyed the full syringe. Bella walked over to Jesse's hulking but still form. Thankfully, she could see the rise and fall of his chest or all of this would be for nothing. She sighed, using a gloved hand to tuck an errant curl behind her ear. "Let's see what this will do to you."

Afterwards when it was all over, Bella would be kind and send him to where the angels would sing Jesse to his rest.

—

As Bella sat on the old rocking chair soothed by the motion, she smiled softly at the silver table she had brought here a few months back and fitted with steel cuffs for both arms and legs. Just to be safe, she strapped a ball gag to his face tightly and apologized as he stayed quiet from the crack to the back of his head with a shovel. Bella had used his caring nature against him, a weapon to get him here and when he fell, his phone was made into a pile of plastic and glass under her heeled boots.

She knew he was chocolate perfection in the upper area of his body. Jesse was indeed, but she left him bare with his jeans around his ankles and stared at his legs. His thighs were cut with the contour of the muscle and thriving tissue beneath the skin. She marveled at the scrotum, his testicles and how glorious his penis could be when erected. God, he was well hung. Bella watched with bated breath still in that rocking chair as the limp cock twitched and then became a pillar slowly but surely. It had to be hard for more than four hours. She wasn't going to call a medical professional or rush her friend to the emergency room. Instead, she would play with it because it was her shiny new toy. After all, Jesse did want her. He did want more from her so Bella could do nothing but oblige him, while taking some of him into herself.

"Stunning," Bella said, slowly and softly like if she raised her voice any louder, his penis would fall limp and be nothing again. She reached out and gently stroked the tip, the veins in the phallic object became engorged with the contents waiting burst forth. A groan was set loose through the gag strapped onto his face. The limbs started to move underneath the silver restraints and then strain against them. The groans grew louder, more guttural and sounding more painful but Bella would make it stop soon.

She walked over to his side and observed the raised veins in his neck, the way his chest rose and fell with heaving breaths and the way he fought the mechanical force pining him down. She couldn't very well do it, strong as she was. Jesse had the physical means to overpower her and Bella had to rectify that. His eyes flew open and immediately recognized her, brown polls that glittered with surprise, shock and alarm. Jesse physically shook upon laying eyes on her and she soothed him, touching that beautiful face. His bone structure was breathtaking.

"Shhh," she soothed and smiled, touching his face. "I know, I know. I shouldn't have done this to you. But my boyfriend and I are over. It makes me incredibly sad. After all that time, we're over. It's a year of my life I'll never get back, Jesse. I just needed a friend and here you are. Isn't that great that we can be close like this?"

Jesse gave a louder grunt of protest and squeezed his eyes shut, fighting against the sensation of his hardened dick and the ache under his skin she had triggered. He sounded muffled and panicked so Bella sighed, and loosened the gag enough that it fell loose around his neck. She always did appreciate the deep sounds the lungs made when sucking in the breath it craved.

"Bella—what—did…" he started, eyes flitting wildly in his disorientation. He screamed again, almost a growl as if something had ripped inside of him. "It hurts…. Fuck—what did you do to me? What did…?" Another scream. Another pulsing of his penis as it continued to stand erect. "I… You're insane! What the…fuck?"

She grabbed both sides of his head and forced it down so he had nowhere to look but her eyes. Jesse had no one to focus on but her. In the expense of this cottage in the middle of oblivion, it would be just him. Jesse and Bella. Bella and Jesse. Here, she could let everything grow and breathe and let her true intentions shine through.

"He sensed that we were more than friends. I had to admit that," Bella said, touching his face with the care of one handling glass. She let her voice break with just enough tearfulness and sadness. "I did want you. I do want you. I wanted you the way I couldn't want him. I couldn't have sex with Connor without seeing you, without feeling you. It—it was an accident when I called out your name, and not his but—but Connor was right. Guess it wasn't an accident in hindsight. It was something I desired. I desire you just like you do me. You have me, not him. I couldn't have sex with him anymore without craving what you felt like, Jesse."

"Let me go!" Jesse yelled, and then strained through another wave of burning. "What are you saying right now? Are you insane?"

Bella clicked her tongue and shook her head as if making and coming to a decision that was never on the table, pun intended. She left him, his legs spread out as far as it would go. Still, the pillar between his legs stood tall and proud and Bella took it in her grip and went up and then down. Jesse let out a moan. It was most likely involuntary, triggered by the nerve endings over stimulated by her drug cocktail. Either way, it made her happy and made her very, very ready.

She squeezed it, engorged with blood, with enough pressure to cause pain.

"No," she answered, coldly now. "I possess you. I don't let go of what's mine."

Bella stepped back and piece by piece she removed articles of clothing from her body. She slid off her hat, letting her signature curls fall free. She walked over with her jacket on the floor and boots sprawled out next to it and turned the dust covered blinds shut. She pulled a face of disgust but shook it off, glancing at Jesse spread out on her table still. This was more important and she couldn't feel like she was being watched. Bella couldn't lose her focus. Jesse shut his eyes, shaking as beads of sweat lined his forehead and ran down the side of his face from his temples. She continued to strip. Bella removed her jeans, stepping out of them. Next came her shirt as it fell on top of the growing pile of clothes until she stood almost naked, wearing pink underwear and a matching pink bra that housed her breasts. Lastly, she pulled her leather gloves off and dropped them. She really wanted to touch him and feel every part of him.

"Please stop fighting or you will force me to hurt you and I don't want to," Bella chided, gently with a soft smile. "Don't worry. I'll make it all better. For both of us."

Jesse strained and fought against the steel, making the veins in his forearms rise.

She stepped towards him and with a slow smile, took off her underwear until she truly was free. Jesse regarded her with focused, stubborn eyes as if he was fighting the physiological reactions using his mental force of will. He cried out and she smirked, feeling herself dampen in anticipation. She traced his face with the back of her hand.

"You're the most beautiful thing I've ever laid eyes on," she whispered, running a hand down to feel the ridges of his abdomen through his shirt. Sweat made the white fabric transparent as it made it look as if he was wrapped by saran wrap. Bella let her hands glide over his thigh. A finger dragged down his inner thigh and her hand brushed against the base of his still erect penis and he moaned, deep in his throat. She wasn't talking to him, though. "I want you. Fuck, I want you."

Bella brought her gaze upward and stepped to meet his eyes. This time, the defiance and stubbornness was gone and they pleaded with her.

"Please… stop… I don't want… Don't kill me, please."

Bella got in his face and grinned, drawing an imaginary line across his throat. It was bumpy due to his Adam's apple. It bobbed up and down as he swallowed.

She hissed, "I don't care what you want, Jesse. What you want is to give yourself to me. I will have all of it and watch you submit to me," she smiled, softly reverting back to her normal tone. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. We're friends. I promise this won't be weird at all. This will be as good for me as it will for you. Only you could do this," she added, tone saccharine sweet. "Just you… I love you."

Bella repeated the phrase over and over as if it were a prayer but she wasn't seeing Jesse anymore. She wasn't seeing him as the sweet boy who cared enough to come here because she called him distraught. Bella wasn't seeing her buddy as the boy who knew her favourite flavour of frozen yogurt and what to say to elicit a smile from her. She climbed on top of him with ease due to years of gymnastics before she transferred her love of moving the body outward to being mesmerized by movements of the inner parts of the body. She swung one leg over so she straddled him. Her heart beat and raced in her chest and without making any bodily contact with her treasure so fucking close, she moaned at the sensation of pleasure coiling itself tightly in her abdomen. Bella raised herself opening her legs at the right angle and with an anticipatory inhale, guided herself.

—

"Mmmm," Bella smiled against his neck and met his frightened eyes. She took her hands and held his face between them. He was buzzing and she let herself absorb it. "You taste so good. You feel even better."

She rode him once in a motion that started slowly and he screamed again before his breath start to turn shallow. Bella pounded herself onto him, forcefully, needing to feel him be ready for her. Jesse had to explode for her and give her his very soul. She wanted his waterfall, Jesse's ocean and his sea. She wanted to swim it all by myself and drown it until he became an earthquake and there was a bloody series of aftershocks.

Bella's anger smashed through her steady patience and fueled her speed as she forced herself to rip him apart and again. Whether or not he wanted to, he raised himself against to enter her deeper than he was. She was hungry, famished, craving satisfaction and he shuddered under her, squeezing his eyes.

"Don't you dare do this to me now!" she growled, sweat breaking out on her skin as she dug her nails into his skin because she didn't want her fingers to slip off the merry-go-round. Bella cursed loudly and screamed so loud, it bounced off the wooden walls. They always had to look at her. They were never allowed to go into the abyss by themselves. Bella ruled the River Styx and would guide them into death because she could control that and them. She could feel herself rip apart, the dark tentacles of her core scratching and clawing in her abdomen.

Digging her nails into his shoulders, Bella continued her ride. She was on a carousel. She was on a merry-go-round, spinning faster and faster. Up and down. Up and down. Round and round, holding onto the pole until she cramped and straddling her hardened horse so tightly, its exterior cracked underneath the force of her thighs. She was a flower waiting to open and letting the petals bloom and aching to let the thorns along their stems get their edges. All she needed were the seeds, little seeds and torrential that would give them life even when his breath would be taken. She wouldn't give it back.

He shook again, and took in a strangled breath. Her hands held his head, half-forcing him and half-guiding him down the river. Bella stared into the brown pools, filling with tears and Jesse gritted his teeth.

Jesse's breathing grew shallow and his eyes rolled into his head until she saw the whites of them. She slapped and then punched him in that beautiful face. His nose began to bleed and for that, she was sorry. Bella wasn't sorry in terms of feeling guilty. "Good…good…Come on, Jesse. Let me have you."

Finally. Finally.

 _Finally._ That was satisfaction. Absolution. Accomplishment.

—

The most beautiful scream ripped from his throat. Bella closed her eyes to feel his orgasm and cried out loudly, feeling her own. He erupted like a volcano and the lava burned her insides. They twisted and Bella saw a silky black ribbon twisting and bending in the slowly building and growing tornado. The screaming was loud, rough and its origin from the soul, it seemed. The endorphins rushed to her head. She saw everything upside down. Bella saw Jesse on top of her, inside her and giving himself to her of his free will. She saw a beautiful union, she saw Jesse's hands in her hair and caressing her face in the throes of sex.

But here she was on top of him unwinding, splitting to glass shards before she was put together again. Jesse fed her until Bella absorbed him and gorged on him. Jesse's body clenched and his muscles tensed and then he orgasmed, shooting one more piece of himself into her. Her heart stopped and so did his.

When it did, Bella's heartbeat started again and slowly she started to steady her breathing. Bella slid herself off and separated for him and his cock slowly but surely fell limp. She didn't move from him but still pulled herself up to straddle his hips. It would have been impolite to not say thank you after something so beautiful. She brought a shaky hand to comb back the curls that had fallen. She grinned, sweat on her body and gooseflesh on her skin.

The blood from his nose had travelled to his upper lip and dried.

"Thank you," she said, softly. Jesse replied with a groan, the veins in his neck making themselves become visible. "I told you this would be good for both of us. I know. It was as intense for you as it was for me. Thank you so much. I love you. Don't you love me?"

Bella watched him, some contours of his face still visible and still mesmerizing. She could take a paintbrush and reproduce it on paper but no. Paper could be carried away and forgotten so she would stare at it and paint it in her mind.

"Don't you love me, Jesse?" she asked again, and then grew angered by his silence. "Hmm? You said you did. Say it!"

Jesse's eyes focused on her and his body began to loosen. His muscles lost some of its firmness and Bella figured the ricin was starting to take effect. She rubbed the reddening injection site on his neck, gently as if trying to soothe him. His skin felt like smooth milk chocolate under her fingers. She bent down and pressed a kiss to his mouth, catching some of the dried blood on his top lip. A renewed craving slithered down her spine and spread out across the surface of her smooth back. He tasted sweet. It was like her favourite kind of chocolate: milk chocolate with light brown caramel inside.

"Say you love me…" she demanded whispering roughly against his mouth, Jesse's vermillion caramel on her tongue. "You fucking love me. You love me like Connor and Christian do. You. Love. Me."

Jesse drifted and began to tremble slowly and then quicker under her. His breathing stopped in his throat, his chest seized and he became rigid. His eyes rolled in the back of his head again and his head rattled. She held it steady between her hands to watch his face contort in frozen pain. His perfect white teeth clamped themselves together as he seized. Bella knew the ricin was wreaking havoc inside of him and forcing his body to find a new source of life.

No, Bella thought with a slow smile on her face, Jesse was leaving her and she would treasure a special part of him and be grateful for what he had given her. The warmth was comfortable and soothing like her mother's ghost had come and rocked to sleep. Bella had given her friend the gift of freedom and peace.

Jesse's seizing slowly lessened in movement until it stopped, blood in his mouth and like the rest, the light and sweetness left his eyes. Bella stared into them, making it they were empty before she closed them.

Bella rested her head against his chest, devoid of heartbeat and breath. She pressed a soft kiss to his sweat soaked material of his shirt and put her head back down.

"I'll remember you, Jesse," Bella said to the air around her. She would remember her friend and his willingness to welcome her. She had done what she set out to do in the end: conduct another successful exploration of another human body and respectfully her cadaver a farewell. "Goodnight sweet prince and the flight of angels sing thee to thy rest…"

Bella finally got off the table when his dark skin lost its shine and began to harden with rigor mortis. She dressed herself and that was all she remembered. The rest of the night was a blur to her as if an unseen hand had pressed fast forward. She found herself removed from her actions and felt as though she could rest because someone else had stepped into the driver's seat. Another pair of hands, cold yet familiar, helped her move Jesse's heavy body, helped her dug the hole deep enough to cover and easy to hop out of. The hands glided, giving off black wisps from its fingers as they moved. Bella covered up the body with the earth it would soon merge into because of decomposition and let the shovel fall numbly from her hands.

Bella looked down at the limp organ in her grasp and smiled fondly. Happiness filled her like a slowly expanding helium balloon. It was her eighth wonder in a world that has hers alone. It was a rare jewel in her hands so she took care of it just as it had taken care of her. Stroking its length from tip to where the testicles had started, she brought to her lips and kissed it. Bella knelt burying that too. She put it deep in the folds of the leaves and cool soil. She would come back for it, one day.

One day when she missed it enough and felt nostalgic, Bella promised to dig it back up and revel in something that had once been majestic and wholly hers.

—

Bella stood from her vanity, smacking her lips for even distribution of her lipstick. She remembered the memory of Jesse's experiment, relieved that she could conjure it. It was out of order, nestled somewhere between Nadia's and Janice's. It was from Estee Lauder and came in a colour called _Pure Envy_. Silver chandelier earrings hung from her ears. She stood, admiring herself clothed in black and dark red. Her brown hair went from typical curly to shiny straight.

It took a bit of maneuvering but she managed to zip up her dress and adjust the sweetheart neckline so she was comfortable. Her phone rang, Connor's name and face emblazoned on her screen and she welcomed the familiarity. Remembering Christian's two texts in the flurry of Connor's loving ones, she frowned and resisted the itching in her fingers to only to be relieved by throwing her phone against a wall.

Bella found her heels by her bedroom door sure that she had left them downstairs but all the same, slid her feet in them and balanced herself against a wall to buckle them. The threads of confusion started to form in her head but she shook them off until they were as strong as cobwebs. She made her way down the stairs.

Still, her phone rang in between seven missed calls from him.

Bella sighed, answering his eighth call.

"Connor, hi…" Bella greeted, in a light tone. She concentrated on getting down the stairs. "Are you on your way, babe?"

"Yes. Finally," Connor answered, far away with shuffling sounds in the distance. Bella deduced that he was on speaker phone, most likely at home. He added, aggravation on the edges of his tone. "I had to fix something with the florist but I promise, it's all perfect for you. You'd be happy with them, right? Yellow roses. There were eleven of them and I had to fix it because eleven wasn't going to work."

She hated roses but Bella proposed it was the thought behind the gesture. He hated odd numbers that looked strange and foreign to him. She would try to tolerate the bright yellow petals and imagine them to be exquisite as a bouquet of Queen of the Night tulips or Black Dahlias. However, Connor was sweet that way and loved that about him.

She smiled, "You know, I'd be happy with just you. I love you."

"I love you, too," he replied, and Bella knew he meant it. Connor had given his whole heart to her. The least she could do was care for it even when she was more entranced by it being a beating mass of arteries, veins, and ventricles. His aorta was the largest part of him and that is what Bella loved most. "I'm leaving home now to get you."

"Okay."

Bella made it to the bottom of the stairs and when she raised her gaze, she froze.

She heard her blood rushing in her ears, Connor's voice warped and disjointed. A current of Christian Newman hit her this time when it had been a slow trickle. It had dripped on her, cold and now, it was a tidal wave. She couldn't breathe and fought to ground her feet. Bella stepped off the last stair, her heart in her throat. Her hand curled into a fist, her palm being cut by the crescent marks of her nails. Christian waved at her with a knowing smirk, leaning by the window it appears he had climbed through. He had a nice vested suit on that wasn't that formal and Converse shoes were on his feet.

Connor was saying something to her and Bella was swimming upward to get to the surface. Connor's life preserver was within reach. Christian locked the window and he took easy strides to the dark mahogany desk by the door. Just like that, he shoved her back into the depths of a body of water she was trying to avoid.

"What?" she managed to squeeze out, nearly dropping the phone because of the heat of his blue-eyed gaze. Christian casually opened the drawer of the desk and retrieved a flash of silver from it.

"I'm just happy we've been dating for a year. Didn't you hear what I said?"

"No, no," Bella clarified with a smile that hurt to plaster on her face and a reassuring, calm tone that felt like swords in her windpipe. "I heard. I'm happy, too. Best year of my life and I want to have forever with you, baby."

"Me too."

Bella said goodbye, anger churning in her chest and feeling so electric it physically shook her frame. She hung up, took slow steps to stand across from a visitor she wasn't expecting or want. Christian twirled the glinting sliver in his hands, looking at her as daring her to move. Maybe move toward him. Move to kill him. Move to be the gasoline to his smoldering flames. Bella let go of her love and gripped her hatred, so she wouldn't suffocate. She needed to hold onto something and aside from the stuffed pink sock monkey from childhood, that was it.

—

"Ah," Bella said, calmly as a slow smile grew on her face to mask her anger. "You've found me again, haven't you?"

"I always find you which is why you're better off with me."

Bella chuckled and shook her head. "No way that's happening. I'm with Connor."

"That's temporary."

"What are you doing here?"

Christian stopped twirling it but his gaze stayed focused on the thread of silver. It morphed into a thick cord and then became something familiar. It was the letter opener. Bella watched her dad use it to open a letter, a bill, or a promotional letter from one company or another. She wasn't interested in the content but rather, she was interested in the way the blade made rough sounds against the paper but cut through it smoothly.

Christian ran his finger along the foot long blade, careful not to cut himself.

He stepped over to her, and offered it with the hilt pointed at her.

"Triggering you, Bella," he answered, nonchalantly. His smile matched hers. Bella was fighting with him and she would come out victorious. She'd kill for the win. "Only because I know you in a way my brother doesn't. Where did you go tonight before you put yourself together to look as beautiful as you do right now?"

Bella glowered at him, annoyed and defiant, "I could shoot you for climbing my window and breaking into my house."

"You'd love that. You'd also love the way something so simple and ordinary could do so much damage. You would love the idea of something small doing big things that leave an impact," Christian said, ignoring her. He pushed the hilt of the letter opener towards her. His face hardened, his eyes darkening. "Right now, you want to see what it feels like to have this letter opener move and glide against skin. Show me. Show me how you killed Bree Sanders in the inner sanctum of your murder house."

"You're not triggering me, Christian. Annoying me, sure. Amusing me, even."

"No?" Christian challenged, taking her hand and enclosing her fingers around the cool metal. He smiled again, using his free hand to stroke the apple of her cheek and the skin burned. The rosy coloured blush she had carefully applied was changing into an invisible burn mark. "Bree has been cremated and your murder house has been made to ashes. _I_ burned it tonight."

The water that has saturated her had dried. In its place, she felt the black ribbon grow and stretch. The ribbon stopped being smooth and a picture of weird beautiful as whatever little light tried to hit it. _No. No. No. No._ There was no light anymore. There was a falcon of pure black circling her under its squawking cry cracked her purple sky and ripped her bloody red moon in half. Bella stared at him, shaking. The dark falcon's claws pierced her deeply until she bled. Black inky liquid nestling inside of her slowly leaked. It bled through her dress, leaked out through her pores. It ran down her legs from between her legs, darkening the burgundy half of her dress.

Bella felt it leak from her follicles and matted her newly straight hair. It was all ruined. It was all destroyed. With a burst of strength she knew she had but never exhibited unless she had pushed to her limit, she swiftly snatched the letter opener and pinned Christian down, straddling him. It was a quick series of movements but even with Christian looking up at her smugly, she felt that familiar need.

She held the letter opener against his throat, two brown freckles on the side of his neck and a blue vein under his skin being a path between them. Her hands shook and that made her fearful. There was something familiar in his eyes, something recognizable that stretched and breathed underneath his skin. His eyes dulled to a near slate grey. Bella felt a sharp tremor between her legs and the heat of her anger clash against each other.

"There it is…" Christian observed, and moved to give Bella more access to his throat against the silver, glinting blade. The shadow of a smile pulled his lips upwards. She stared at him while Christian stared through her and she shivered. "You want to know. You've always wanted to know. What it would be like to have the blade cut through my flesh. How smooth it cuts. If I'd bleed slowly or if I'd bleed quickly. Here's your chance. Take it."

"It would be very wise for you to _not_ provoke me. Don't fuck with me," Bella warned, softly yet darkly and pressed the blade against Christian's throat with a little more pressure. "Your mother will lose you tonight if you try me."

"I'm not," Christian replied, flipping her over so she landed on her back. She screamed sharply out of surprise and now, she was the one staring up at him. With the force, the letter opener flew and clattered away from her with a sharp clinking sound. She squirmed against him but he held her down. The strain of her frustration made her laugh, loudly.

"You've been wanting this. You took _your_ chance!"

"Maybe," Christian answered, calmly. His gaze was piercing now and her heart hammered against her ribcage so rapidly, it could have snapped her sternum in many pieces. "But you take a chance with every life you take. There's something dark inside of you, and my brother can't see it because he doesn't want to. He can't. Yet. My brother is brilliant. You know that. He can put a business proposal together in his sleep but you…you've done something to him."

A laugh that sounded more like a broken cackle escaped her lips, stained dark red.

"Well done, Freud."

"You're anything but delicate, Bella. How much?" Christian asked, in curiosity.

Her mouth twisted into a sharp smile and she struggled to move a wrist against him, only for him to effortlessly hold her down in place. She cursed between clenched teeth. Then she screamed, loud and guttural.

"Let me go, asshole!"

"No."

"How much what?"

"Darkness. How much," Christian asked, loudly to get her attention and tracing a fire and ice path down her throat, to her chest and in the center of her abdomen, "is inside of you? Because I see it. It's a thrill for you, I know. _Connor_ is a thrill for you. My brother's emotions, for all his brilliance, are erratic," he smiled, proudly as if he'd won a game Bella didn't know the rules to. "When that brilliance catches up with those unpredictable emotions, he _will_ see you. It's fascinating the way you twist him up and leave him blind. Impressive even."

Bella narrowed her eyes, "He does see me!" she screamed, louder, and scratched his face in a quick smooth movement. Christian's head snapped to the side from the impact before he settled into his typical calm. It was maddening but left Bella curious and she didn't want to be but she was more concerned with wanting to tear him to pieces. She scurried out of his grasp and he stood, wiping the thin line of blood that had welled on his cheek. She stood on shaky legs, and ragged breaths. "He loves me!"

Bella glared at him, eyes fixed on the smeared blood she had drawn and laughed again. She found her footing, adjusted her hair and makeup. She was Connor's perfect girl. She would stay his perfect girl and they would be perfect together. Connor would see nothing but her, and everything encompassing her.

She mocked him, eyes wild and lips in a smile as confident as his.

"He sees all of me, Christian. He sees me when he touches me and says I'm his," she whispered roughly, the smoothness of his ash grey vest under the pads of her fingers. "He sees me when he gives me his heart. He lets me take him until I drain him dry and still, he still sees me."

"Don't you know?" Bella continued, raising her gaze to meet his steely gaze. Her dark brown eyes flitted over to his cheek, the skin raised red and still bleeding but not as much. She bit her bottom lip with a coy smile that did not hold innocent intentions. "Connor's going to continue to love me because I will be all he will ever want or need. The bottom line is," she lowered her tone so it was seductive and ran a delicate finger over the scratch now with remnants of dried blood, "I'm everything he desires."

Christian stopped her hand from tracing a light brown freckle on his neck.

"What are you so scared of?"

Bella retrieved her hand and laughed, "Is that a serious question? I know you want me, too. I can give myself to you and watch him kill you because he loves me enough to protect me. Cain and Abel, no?" she added, with a sigh, touching her hair and smirking. "It sure is something, isn't it?"

Christian snorted and shook his head, "He can take care of himself as long as long as I help it along. Of course, I want you, but I've been going about it all wrong. Someone told me to change my approach. Granted, they must have had their own agenda but it was sound."

"Oh?"

Bella watched him put his hands in his pockets and shrug.

"Yeah. I have," Christian replied and looked at her with that piercing gaze. He was looking through her again. He was searching for something and his lack of fear made Bella bristle. Suddenly, she had no time to long for her letter opener and aching to truly what it felt like to experience it in the way a writer finds harmonious sounds and constants to weave the perfect prose. A shadow of a soft smile appeared on his lips and it contradicted the rough way he pulled her in. "I'm your shadow."

Then he kissed her. When Connor kissed her, Bella could feel the need in them. She could feel him drowning into her and begging her to save him. She felt powerful when she kissed him but Bella needed him, too. She needed him to bend to her will and needed the reckless way Connor would fuck her. His obsessiveness was her high and his compulsion was her aphrodisiac.

When Christian kissed her, Bella didn't know where silence ended and earth-shattering noises start. Bella heard Jesse's guttural scream and he came to life inside her, received its warmth and then slowly left it behind for her. She heard Bree's choking originating from her chest and felt her windpipe bending like a hose under her grip. She saw Nadia's mouth blue from the lips before she jerked around wildly and she spat up white cotton candy. Bella heard nothing from Janice but saw her eyes in vivid technicolour. Christian kissed her slowly and Bella herself start to become dizzy.

The colours had blended together until they were a messy brown. Bella ran her fingers through his mop of hair while kissing his back just as roughly. She felt his colour on her hands. He was grey. Somewhere between. Christian lingered in the middle and that made him an enigma. While Connor smelled of cologne that tickled her nose, Christian smelled of smoke and ash and Bella nearly choked on his fumes.

Then Bella felt herself unravelling. Her dress wasn't so perfect anymore, her lipstick became smudged. She felt Christian's ambiguity and despised it. She had to know. Fuck. She would know. Christian became rough with her as she felt her bare back hit the locked door. If it left a mark, that was fine. It would be proof that Bella was clawing to figure out who Christian Andrew Newman was. Christian pulled away from her, his eyes a shade of blue Bella couldn't look away from. She was breathless. He was trapping her and it made her angry. Her shadowed insides bubbled until everything became like tar.

He stopped, looking at her as if to calculate the many possibilities of what could happen. What he wanted to happen. Bella could see the black bubbles and feel the searing heat under skin so hot, she could almost explode.

The heat scratched at her, making her itchy. Christian did this to her. He was knocking her off-balance. He was turning her inside out. Christian tickled her ribcage and got past her lung, she slapped him before he got deeper. The initial crack reverberated and crackled in the air but electricity never evaporated.

Christian seemed to not be impacted and when Bella went to strike him again, he caught her wrist. Bella pulled her wrist away from him and the grip was broken. She didn't want to think about the 27 bones of his hand, gripping her. Nobody was allowed to do that. Nobody. Nobody was allowed to touch her in a way that shifted power dynamics that made the shadows dissipate. She needed them. Bella _loved_ them. Christian let go.

"I'm late," Christian finally revealed in the silence.

Bella rolled her eyes. "Am I supposed to be interested in that?"

"No. It's a fact. That's all. It doesn't interest me either but I like Gwen's company and it's an easy way to pass the time. Parties like tonight is not my idea of entertainment."

"Get out!" she screamed, eyes flashing. Something churned in her gut. Her brown eyes looked around Christian to lock onto the silver letter opener on the floor. He knew that it lay by his feet. He stepped over it, walked over to the door before leaving, wished her a goodnight with a kiss on the cheek.

She bent down and picked up the letter opener. The cool silver felt like ice and it slowly extinguished Christian's heat underneath her skin. Bella's other hand gripped the blade, slowly shifted to her version of normal. Bella could hear his footsteps, his hand against the doorknob and beginning to turn it. She winced, the sharpness against her palm intensifying. It gave her a feeling of delirium, a high induced by the possibility of feeling blood even it was hers.

Bella could hear his footsteps behind her, his hand on the doorknob and beginning to turn it by the clicking because of its mechanics.

"I'll kill him," she said softly, opening her palm. The pink line was beautiful in the center of it. It was art under her skin. "I'll kill Connor and make him mine forever if you push me."

Even better, she would kill their mother for being in her way. The woman grated her nerves. When they did snap, Bella would let herself snap too and bathe in the bitch's blood.

Christian sighed behind her.

"Goodnight, Bella."

Her heart raced and a cold, shadowed hand worked to soothe and steady it. She grinned and spoke evenly, "Have fun tonight with Gwen, Christian."

The door closed with a slam and a click. Bella turned around and saw a puddle on the floor. It was Christian's colour. He was no longer grey and perhaps, he never was. Her eyes focused on the growing puddle, expanding and trickling upwards. It crawled up the wood of the door and slithered across the ceiling. No, Christian didn't bleed grey.

Like her, Christian was black. He was black. Just like her.

 _He bled back._

—

Bella's head was being squeezed as she saw black bleeding on the walls. It was being squeezed and she would see stars in her eyes if she came undone. She had to make it better. She would make it better. Glancing at the silver letter opener in her hands, Bella twisted it in her hands. The light hit it and it sparkled silver like moonlight. Bella glanced at the window and the milky coloured orb in the sky shined against black velvet.

She stared, transfixed as the colours shifted to a normalcy only she understood.

The full moon turned blood red again and she smiled, finding her sanity.

Bella looked at the letter opener. Christian was right about something. She did want to see how smoothly the sharp edges glided against skin. She pressed its blade to the base of her finger and applied pressure until a cut formed deep enough to have blood appear. It was dark red, and it bled over a rivulet hanging underneath her biggest finger until it fell off. Her blood was sparkling as if it had absorbed moonlight. She was enthralled by it. Bella brought her bloody hand to her lips. It was smooth and metallic in the back of her throat and was as intoxicating as her favourite Montoya Cabaret red wine.

* * *

 **connor newman**

He drove with aching red knuckles that had little cuts. They ran parallel and insect each other. Some were deeper than others. Some were circled with dried blood while others were surface wounds. His knuckles ached but Connor didn't mind. It was the same colour of his velvet tie and Bella's dress. His suit was pressed, the white collared shirt was white and clean. His black suit jacket had its two round buttons buttoned straight. His dark hair was done to his standards of neatness and every so often, he ran his lint roller over his jacket and pants. Eight times for each leg which equaled sixteen and eight times for the left and right sides of his suit jacket. Thirty-two times, Connor worked to be perfect and tonight, he would ooze so much charm, it would run over and drown everyone he met in it.

He didn't need the medicine. He didn't need the therapist. Connor didn't want the Clomipramine. There were thirty of them in the amber coloured pill bottle. One a day. Thirty divided thirty always equaled one. One meant he was alone. He was drowning in the numbers. The number one were like thrown knives that gutted him, and the number eight were handcuffs bent into infinity. The number three and its curves lodged in his throat, making it hard to breathe much less scream. Connor gripped the wheel harder because his head was beginning to pound. Sometimes, there were thirty-one days and still thirty pills were still there. Thirty one couldn't be divided by anything because it equaled a number broken and one Connor couldn't and didn't want to understand. It was as nonsensical as the number 289. 289. The number of tiles on Dr. Forsythe's ceiling of her office, where all the framed pictures of her family and degrees were askew and made him anxious. When he was anxious, Connor became angry. 289 was the number 17 falling on itself. Connor would not let himself collapse fall to jagged pieces. He would not let the imperfections suffocate him.

Connor gripped the steering wheel tighter with a laser focus on the lights and road in front of him. When he needed to drive straight, he did. When Connor needed to turn, he counted the steady sound of the clicking his turn signal made. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven –

"Damnit!" he cursed, loudly and sharply turned left. Seven. It was that number with the sharp edges and straight lines that joined themselves together to form a point that could stab him. It would penetrate his skin and make him bleed. He counted the traffic lights he stopped at when it was red, slowed down when he was amber and drove off when it was green. Three colours. Three choices for him to choose on the road. Three. Three. Three. His head pounded and Connor could feel it splitting apart.

His hands shook as he turned on Bella's street. Connor was almost there. He conjured up her house with its four walls, eight windows from front to back and the four steps he had to climb to get to her. Connor pulled over on a quiet side street, closing his eyes and forcing air into his lungs. He counted his breaths both the exhales and the inhales.

One. Two… Three. Four. Five… Seven. Eight. Nine –

Nine. It was an odd number and had no room in his bubble of even numbers, perfect numbers. The even numbers were bright and shining. When they split in half, they burst like sparklers. The odd numbers were awkward in their formation and in the way they phonetically arranged themselves on his tongue. The number 9 was curvy, multiple times over and swung to slice him like the Grim Reaper's scythe.

Connor couldn't think and he couldn't see because his vision was swimming. His counting became strange and incomprehensible but he did comprehend the cool, soft hand on his face. He smiled, placing his hand on it. She wore white because she was an angel. Her eyes were shinning. He could see magic on her skin and Connor didn't want it to stop feeling it under his skin. She was his, just his and no one else was allowed to have her. Connor was being pulled down in Bella's quicksand but he would not resist because he wanted to suffocate. He wanted to be a part of her just like Bella was part of him.

"You came…"

"You needed me. Of course, I came," Bella replied, softly. She touched his face with the back of her hand. "I love you, y'know."

Connor replied, automatically, as she moved her little frame to straddle him. He was in the driver's seat. Her hands felt like feathers on his face and she smelled like daises in spring. A curl fell in her face and Connor gently moved it to stare at it, into it. She was beautiful, captivating and felt like the cool wind of night on his skin.

"I love you, too."

"Good," she grinned. "Good…"

She pressed slow burning kisses to his neck, his jaw and his mouth. Those feather light hands moved slowly to trace his belt. Connor ached for her so badly, it almost hurt. Bella's glance went from his face, downward as he felt her fingers do a quick dance of unbuckling his belt accompanied by the sound of tinkling bells. He put his head back, slightly inclining his driver's seat and placed his head on the head rest. Connor squeezed his eyes shut, the ache getting more intense and acuter, it made him grit his teeth and nearly taste blood.

"You don't need anyone, babe. You don't need the medication and the shrink," she laughed, making him hear those bells. They made his eardrums tingle and vibrate. The wind she carried with her, brushed his bare lap and caused goosebumps on the skin of his thighs. "Christian hates you. He wants to take it all from you. Your dad loves him more, sweetie. Your mom," she said, softly, feathered hands caressing his penis, "is trying to control you. They're all…trying to control you. Let me love you, Connor. Only I can."

Connor kissed her roughly as he felt himself start to harden in her grasp.

"Let me make it better," Bella whispered against his mouth. "I'll make everything better."

—

He counted the sharpened knives of the dark surface of that gnarled and twisted cocoon as Bella's kisses became more intense, wilder and frenzied. Connor lost his spot. He lost himself in the rapid succession of numbers swirling around him. They were adding themselves, then subtracting, suffocating him with multiplication and then pushed into the abyss of division.

—

Connor felt the cocoon's thorns stab and rip through him. He didn't know anything anymore, couldn't comprehend anything and couldn't feel anything except her. He squeezed his shut and cursed through his teeth, pleasure not running through his body as soft touches and vibrations but felt like stomping that left him carrying within him a series of aftershocks. He imagined Bella's house with the eight windows. He visualized the four steps of her house. Connor would allow his clean shoes to climb those four stairs. Connor then imagined Bella as an angel, a vision spawned from his sweetest dreams and made his nightmares unable to taint him.

Connor smiled, deliriously as he imagined kissing Bella and never breathing again. He didn't want to. The cocoon in his stomach burst like a balloon stretched its limits and pure black butterflies with no colour fluttered around. He saw them flutter around until they stopped, melting into one entity. The liquid thickened until it formed a small wrist, and webbed out to form slender fingers. The fingers expanded to form claws and it touched its face before it scratched him, slowly and painfully.

Connor felt Bella's lips on his bloody cheek and she grinned at him.

"I told you. You're all better. You're so peaceful and you need to hold on to it forever. Your parents will take it from you. Christian will take your happiness away from you the most. He'll take me from you if you let him. Make sure he doesn't, babe."

"How?"

Bella stared him in the eye, the darkness in her face returned.

"Kill him, Connor. That's it."

Connor frowned, "I can't do that, Bella. He's my…brother. He's my family."

"He's an obstacle. I'm your family! If you don't do this, you'll lose me," Bella argued, placing her hands on his face. She was kissing him until he was bending. Connor was being twisted by her and then he heard himself crack and break. Bella pulled away, and he saw her eyes. Her left one was brown and her right one pure black. His hand shook as he fingered a stray, wispy curl. He was bleeding everywhere. "Kill Christian. You're smart."

Connor was hesitant and blinked. His brow furrowed trying to unravel what Bella was asking of him. He was mad at Christian, irritated with him and sometimes, he visualized killing him. But it was never something he could make a reality. Christian never pushed him there. No. No. He wouldn't. There had to be another way.

"No," Connor refused, shaking his head. The doctor talked to him to make sure his head didn't float away. Maybe the medication made him stop submerging himself into the condo's pool and letting himself sink to the bottom finding a peaceful kind of silence. He shook his head. "I won't. I love you with all of my heart. But he's my brother."

Bella stared at him and then glanced down. "Okay," she said, quietly. "Fine."

He offered her a wry smile. "Please don't be mad at me."

"I'm not."

"You're—you're not."

"Of course not," Bella answered and looked at him, smiling at him. He gasped, taking in a sharp intake of breath. Everything hurt. Pain spread out like shot of adrenaline, tainted with corrosive poison. He shook as dark red bloomed against pristine and pressed material. He couldn't breathe. His throat felt like it was closing up. Connor grit his teeth and counted the throbbing in his abdomen and counted Bella's five fingers deeply embedded in it.

"What are you…doing?"

Bella grinned and Connor felt the claws ripping him apart.

"I know, sweetie. It hurts," she soothed, quietly, touching him with her free hand. It lightly scratched his face. The beautiful monster was back and Connor didn't know whether to stay or run away screaming. He wanted to rip all these stained clothes off his body. It made him feel dirty so he screamed. And then screamed some more. " _Christian_ is hurting you right now. He's causing you this pain and it isn't fair. Why wouldn't you let him hurt you? Hurts us? You've failed."

Failure. Disappointment. Loss.

"I'm…sorry," Connor ground out, squeezing his eyes shut. Slowly, in about 228 seconds, the pain melted away. He was clean and perfect again. He heard a quiet sniffle and saw Bella again. Her cheeks were rosy, skin flushed and her eyes shiny with unshed tears. A small one rolled down her cheek and he gently wiped it away. "Don't cry. I hate when you're sad."

"I know you do. I hate being scared of Christian. You have to make him disappear. He's going to hurt you. Is keeping him better than losing me and my love to him? You're the better brother and you'll end up with nothing. It isn't fair, is it?"

"No," he answered, quietly. "No. It's never been…"

Bella took his hand and traced his palm. He ran a slender finger and traced the biggest line in it until it bled. It was silver. A type of silver that didn't metallic but looked like liquefied stardust. Bella told him he was powerful. She told him he was special and he bled brilliance and innovation. She glanced down again, and kissing his plan smiling against it.

"Kill him, Connor. When you get scared, I'll help you. Think of me."

And then she was gone.

—

Connor saw Christian's blood drip between his fingers and didn't mind it all.

—

"Hey, you," Bella greeted him with a kiss. Connor was speechless, unable to verbalize how beautiful she looked in her black and burgundy dress. He suddenly appreciated her dark hair straight and imagined all the ways, he could run her hands through it. She kissed him a little longer, making him place his hands on her face. Her skin was soft in his hands and the sweet smell of her perfume was addictive. She wrapped her arms around his neck loosely before she pulled away. Bella placed another quick kiss to his lips and smiled at him as she had in his car. Bella Fisher was truly his angel and she chased his nightmares away. "Happy anniversary."

Connor presented her with his bouquet of bright yellow flowers. She took them, walking into her house as she followed him.

"They're beautiful. I love them."

He remembered, seeing a bandage around her finger that blended into her skin. Connor hated her seeing hurt, or the idea of it. It was wrapped around her middle finger two times.

"What's with your finger?"

"Oh!" Bella shouted from the kitchen. "I was making a snack and got stupid with a knife. Nothing a Band Aid can't fix. I'm fine, but you're sweet for caring."

Bella turned a corner and re-appeared with the yellow flowers in a clear glass vase, water at the bottom. She set it on the center table and she kissed his cheek. Bella grabbed her clutch from the couch and sighed. She turned around and he saw something change in Bella's tiny frame. Was she mad at him? Had he done something wrong? Were eight flowers not the right wrong when he could given her four to make her happy? Bella looked at him with a smile that didn't reach her eyes and Connor frowned in concern. He walked over to her, stroking her bare shoulders.

"Hey," Connor said, softly, "what's wrong? Was it the flowers because—"

"No, no," Bella shook her head, making her earrings move. She took his hand and held it between her smaller hands. Her hands shook should been warm like they always would. This time, they were cold and Connor resisted the urge to shiver. "You didn't do anything wrong. You're so good to me," she kissed his reddened knuckles. "It's— _I_ did something wrong."

Connor frowned, and his heart began to race. He could feel the hairs at the back of his neck stood up. He forced the anger in his gut to slow down if it couldn't stop entirely.

"What did you do?"

Bella sighed, shifting her gaze away from him. Connor realized his girlfriend sounded like she was on the brink of crying. She exhaled and it sounded shakily and she rubbed her bare shoulders as if protecting herself. Whatever it was, Connor promised he'd protect her. He just needed to know.

"Christian," Bella began, sniffling as tears pooled in her beautiful eyes. "He was here tonight. Before you came. I was wrong because I didn't throw him out when he started…"

She trailed off and Connor counted the ticking of the clock in the living room. He needed to count until he hit an even number. The ticking was steady and to its rhythm, counted. Connor's hands curled to fists so tightly, his nails dug into his palms and half-mooned shaped marks imprinted themselves under her skin. All ten nails dug into the skin and no, the number ten was even but split by two groups of five. Five was odd and it didn't fit. Just like Christian didn't fit. One meant solitude. Two was perfect. Three was suffocating and crowded.

"Started what?" Connor asked, calm but angry. "You need to tell me right now or I will find that shithead brother of mine, get the truth and kill him."

Bella's head snapped up, her eyes wide. "No! Please, don't. It was just that he came here because he knew I was with you. I was alone tonight and he took his chance. I said he wanted to be with me because he was a better man and he was one for me. I'm only telling you because I have to be honest. The last thing I want to do is come between you and your family."

Connor continued counting the ticking of the clock even as his fingers and that clawed hand drove itself into his abdomen and started shredding his insides.

"It doesn't matter," Connor snapped and then apologized but the residue of his anger remained. "Did he kiss you?"

"What?"

"Did he kiss you, Bella?"

"Yes," she answered, after a pause. "But I slapped him for it. I told him – I made it clear that I wanted you and I wasn't going to leave you. He pinned me down to prove a point and I was scared," her lip trembled and she quieted a sob in her throat. Connor still counted the ticking of the clock and the claws tore through him. He felt himself staining the invisible thread with splotches of dark red. "It made me feel dirty and cheap, so I reacted."

"Do you kiss him?"

Bella reared back a little and looked confused, "Why would I do that when I'm with you?"

Connor watched as her eyes flashed with anger. Her eyes went from the dark brown to pure black. Her nails were painted dark red in colour and slowly, he saw the sharp claws again. They looked as if they could cut through steel. Her mouth twisted in a cruel smirk and she laughed.

"Are you serious right now? You think Christian's shadow suffocates you so fucking much that I would rather be with him, and not you? Do you know how insulting it is to ask me that? Hmm? It is our anniversary! What is the matter with you?" Bella continued to scream at him, as Connor stood rooted to his spot. "Why can't you see that I love _you_? Christian does _not_ fit with us!"

Connor watched her stop mid-rant and she exhaled, the dark eyes and her sharp nails gone.

Bella's eyes filled with tears and she stepped back from him. She said quietly, "I just…" she sniffled. "Connor, I'm sorry I blew up. I didn't mean to. Christian freaked me out, okay? I wasn't expecting him to show up here and kiss me. He caught me off guard. I was hurt that you'd doubt me. I'd never _ever_ hurt you that way. Forgive me, please. I don't mean to be this on edge."

Connor softened and pulled her in. He wiped a small tear from her face. She was his perfect girl, his angel on earth again. She laid his head against him and wrapped her arms around his waist.

"I know," he replied gently, kissing the top of her head. "I'm sorry, too. It's just that I hate the thought of my brother getting between us. You love me. You chose me. We're happy together. I know that to be true now."

He continued counting the clock's ticking, forcing the numbers to stop stretch as far as possible. Numbers could run on forever. They never stopped. Numbers even ran on when they reached infinity. Infinity. That was permanent, just like Connor and Bella. The clock ticked away, minutes blending into oblivion. Connor stared at Bella in silence. He took in her face. The proportionate features on it and the way one feature would move, triggering others like a domino effect. It was a culmination of some of his favourite expressions from her. Right now, he wanted her to be like his beloved numbers.

Connor wanted Bella for himself to infinity. He wanted to shove herself into an oblivion composed of him, and watch her face as she became his and he heard Bella's soft moans breaking his name into two broken syllables. Connor wanted to make her feel all of him as the two of them became one and Christian was an evaporating ghost of nothingness. Christian wasn't his brother. He wasn't the son of Adam and Chelsea Newman, and he wasn't chasing what he already had. So, Connor kissed her, catching Bella's surprised gasp in his mouth. He kissed her roughly and greedily.

Bella pulled away from him, breathless, flushed skin and a rosy blush in her cheeks.

"Connor, I—"

"I saw you tonight," he cut her off, speaking softly and distantly. He touched her straight hair when he saw her familiar curls. "You were beautiful."

Bella placed her small hand on the one he rested on her cheek and smiled, serenely.

"You needed me."

He nodded, dreams and reality colliding. "Yeah, I did. You came and made me all better."

"Of course. I'll never leave you," Bella promised and kissed him. She tasted of peppermint. Connor stared into her eyes. Brown and glittering with love for him. She smiled. "I'm always here for you. You can trust me," she combed slender fingers gently through his hair by his ear. "I want you, Connor. Please."

Connor stared at her before his face broke out into a smile.

"I feel the same."

—

Connor couldn't breathe, think or even dream in any sequence that made any coherent sense. When Bella looked him in the eyes and said it was just the two of them, he trusted her. When her tiny frame huddled itself against his bigger one, Connor loved her. One day, he was going to marry her. One day, she would be the mother of his children while Christian watched from the sidelines. In the present – the here and now – all Connor could do was count. He counted the several methodical moves he would have to make to beat his cousin, Katie most of all. She was a chess people but it was a different type. Connor would learn and beat her to the Newman throne. Connor would beat everyone to rule the dynasty his grandfather left behind, and Bella would be his queen.

He counted the frenzied steps he had taken while kissing her until they landed in the kitchen. All ten of her fingers were quickly unbuckling his belt. Connor tore her underwear into two ripping sounds of the two sounds black fabric. Suddenly, he was angry because the little, trivial garment became the biggest barrier to what was his. Connor felt a rush of adrenaline and satisfaction when he effortlessly lifted her off her heeled feet and set her on the smooth white kitchen counter. His dick broke through the lips of her vagina and ventured deeper until he entered her and stayed. Connor cursed at how tight she was. Her ocean was dark and black, but he didn't care. It was smooth and stuck to his skin, but this water stayed on him evenly and shined like diamonds were embedded in it.

Connor rapidly counted rapidly in his mind the many times Bella breathily said his name as he fucked her underneath her dress' skirt. He counted the many times she begged not to stop and laughed at the same time. Bella's perfect two legs were open for him and wrapped themselves around his waist. She roughly pulled him in closer to her. Connor counted all the ways he treasured being inside of her, triumphant that he was the one to navigate deep parts of her Christian couldn't possibly scratch the surface of. Bella kissed him and he may have seen that dark glimmer in her eyes. It was clear enough to be salient in her his head. It was distracting him. Bella's eyes were brown and Connor imprinted the warmth of them on his heart. Her heart was scorching against his skin.

He counted one time his pounded into her and on the next thrust, he came and so did she.

Bella smiled at him as he fought to stay surrounded by her fairy dust and take in the beauty that shined in front of him.

Connor would fix his hair, adjusted his tie and made sure his suit was pristine. Then he would watch her adjust her dress and fix her hair. He would sneak up on her and press kisses to her collarbone as she applied her make-up. Connor thought Bella didn't need any. He appreciated the natural aspect of her face. Right now, she whispered a husky "Happy anniversary" against his mouth and kissed him. Connor thought of perfection. It was in his arms. Perfection was under his skin, burrowed in his veins and stretched around his nerves. He counted again, only getting up to two because that was it. It was enough.

He only knew that he wanted this feeling to last forever and so Connor would ensure it was something that would always last. He would tear the sky open for it, and rip the earth in half to attain it.

Connor wanted to have Bella to infinity and beyond. So, he would.

—

"You think…" Bella started, quietly in his car as she drove. She sighed, shaking her head. "Forget it, Connor. It's stupid."

Connor frowned as they ended up at a red light. One. There was one more traffic light until he walked in all charm and swag with the most beautiful girl on his arm. It was his life, and one of the best decisions he never made and his mom had to accept it. He could see the tension in her body, something cloudy and bigger than she could ever be. Still, there was nothing Bella could say to make him question her, doubt her or abandon her. Connor knew his Bella, his beauty.

"You know nothing you tell me is stupid."

Bella focused her eyes back on the road, little hands getting white at the knuckles. She sighed, and shook her head as she pulled into the venue and scanned her eyes for a parking spot.

"It's just I hate that your mom hates me. I don't get it and I can't rack my brain for any reason she has to feel that way. I mean, she's entitled," Bella said, as she found a spot, put the gear in reverse and start to park. "It makes me feel awful if we're being honest. I hate it and it angers me. Maybe she wants an Ivy League trophy blonde for you. I've had to be polite and swallow it but I won't do it any longer if she pushes me. I don't want to cause any friction in your family. I swear to God," she added, parking slowly and made the car stop. "I love you enough, but I can't take it anymore, Connor. I really don't know what I did to make her hate me."

Connor grabbed her arm as she was about to go.

"Stop," he softly commanded and she did, looking at him with hurt in her eyes. He hated that it was even there to begin with. Connor knew his mom didn't approve of her, but why did she question his decisions when she couldn't scrutinize Christian's life decisions. If he stopped and paused, Connor was sure his mother often showed preferences toward Christian over him even though she didn't intend to. Still, it was maddening and made him feel stupid. It made Connor feel inadequate and he never wanted to let that feel that way. Once was too much and he grew to hate that number as much as he did three.

"We have to go. My dad's going to wonder what's keeping me."

"Screw your dad," Connor told her, fiercely and with conviction. "He hates me too. I hate that he thinks and says I'm no good for you. I want to take care of you, damnit! I want to love you until the day I die and after that. So, we're going to shut everyone in there up immediately."

Bella laughed, and rolled her eyes. "How? You gonna propose or something?"

Connor blinked at her and remembering what had been in his glove compartment for four weeks, went into it before he pulled out a little black velvet box. He opened it and Bella gasped, eyes widening before she started laughing.

"Okay, you almost got me. Seriously, great joke, babe. You can't be serious."

There was a prominent, large square cut ruby set against a silver band of diamonds. It sat nestled in the box. He had gone and picked it out, setting it aside for the perfect opportunity. She was truly his match in every way. A perfect half that matched his and made whatever he and Bella was one shining whole. Rubies, the jeweler had told him, the jewel emphasizing love, passion, devotion and increasing happiness.

"I _am_ serious, Bella. I know. We're too young right now. We're not even finished school, but I'm going to breeze the Wharton School of Business and you'll going to be absolutely brilliant when you finish that Master of Science and Ph. D in Biology and become an amazing Medical Examiner. We'll figure it out together," Connor said earnestly as he tried to not laugh at her stunned face. He did smile though. "I just know I won't be without you. I can't be. It's not an option. So, I'm asking you. Would you, Bella Fisher, do me the honour of becoming my wife? Marry me."

Bella glanced down at the ring and then back at him.

"Is that real?"

"Of course, it is."

"A…real ruby? I've always wanted one."

"I know you have one," Connor answered, touching her hair. He was touching a cloud. "Nothing but the best for you, babe. All you have to say is yes."

She shook her head, "Connor, I—it's too much. I couldn't possibly—no."

"Answer me one question. Actually two. Do you love me?"

"You know I do."

Connor looked into her eyes, and took her hand.

"Will you love me forever?"

Bella smiled, softly and touched his face with her free hand, "Always."

"Okay," Connor said, and kissed her fingers. "Say yes, Bella. Let me put this ring on your finger and we'll tell the world I'm yours for life. That's all I want."

She stared at him before her face slowly lit up with a smile.

"I love the sound of that," she replied and then nodded with a laugh. "Yes. Yes, Connor Newman, I will marry you. Yes, I will absolutely marry you."

Connor grinned and slid the ring on her finger. The stone's center was dark and got redder and redder as the light slowly moved away from it. He smiled proudly at his judgment and how perfectly the jewelry sat on her finger. He grabbed her face between his hands and kissed Bella for the first as her fiancé. _Fiancée_. That word had three syllables but he would fix that. _My fiancée_. Now, that statement had four syllables of fact and truth in it.

Bella pulled apart and rested her forehead against his.

"You're mine forever like you're supposed to be. Happy anniversary, fiancée."

"Back at you," Connor replied, and kissed her cheek. "Let's go celebrate our engagement."

—

The club was decorated intimately. Connor wasn't expecting too many people to be here, even it was a big deal. Of course, Genoa City's top lawyer was retiring with his son, Bella's cousin, taking over. He hoped to take over the family empire one day. Connor always kept his aspirations to ascend to power at Newman Enterprises. It was the only time the number one didn't taste bitterly in his mouth because it was based on fact. The throne only had room for one and it was him. No more, no less. People he knew and strangers alike floated around too slowly for Connor to count them accurately, but when he scanned the room, he squeezed Bella's hand, smiling down at her when he caught her gaze. He paused at the Club's entry away beside its revolving door and kissed her, her face in his hands.

"I think I see my parents," Connor said, softly after breaking the kiss. She looked at him with a nod, and he placed his hand on the small of her back and gently pushed her in the direction of his family. His mother looked beautiful and his dad looked as sharp as Connor aspired to be. He heard Bella's audibly sigh and whispered that everything was fine. Of course, he was an engaged man and his parents were going to be happy for him and welcome Bella into the family. It wouldn't be a long engagement. It would be just 64 weeks. One year and three months. 52 plus 12. Bella would have to agree with him. She would because she loved him enough and it was their magic number. She had helped him find it.

"Dad," Connor greeted, with a nod and charming smile. He extended it his hand, and his dad matched his and shook it firmly twice.

"Hi, son. Bella. It's good to see you again."

Bella smiled, politely, as his dad acknowledged her, "Likewise, Mr. Newman."

Connor watched his mom in her beautiful dress shift and plaster a smile on her face from his periphery and the small amount of irritation crept in. She touched his arm and kissed his cheek with a hug.

"Hi, honey," she greeted him, genuinely and let her eyes flit over to Bella. She wore that tolerant smile. It was the one his mom wore when she didn't like someone but had to be nice for the sake of outward appearances. She could con everyone, but she couldn't lie to him. "Hi, Bella. It's nice to see you."

She sighed, quietly, stared his mother in the face and said, "I wish that wasn't true on your part, Mrs. Newman. It's fine. I hope it will be one day. Maybe your son loving me will persuade you," she glanced over across the room. "Um, I think I see my family. Excuse me. Again, Mr. Newman – have a good night."

She kissed him goodbye and Connor watched her disappear into a sea of people and waiters holding trays with food and champagne flutes.

Chelsea glanced over at his dad and said, "Adam, I think I see Mr. Hadley over there. I'll join you. I just need to speak with Connor."

His dad got the drift, adjusted the lapels of his suit and with another handshake from his father walked away to meet one of his one of his hedge fund associates. It wasn't like Connor didn't have a vague of who Mr. Hadley once. He had met the gentleman twice. However, Connor was too irritated and anxious to care. When it was just the two of them, Connor turned around to meet his mother's face, frowning.

"Mom, I love you, but honestly," Connor questioned, trying to push down his frustration, "I can't do this. I can't be a buffer between you and the woman I love when you go out of your way to make her feel bad. Her mom was your best friend. Dad killed her kid. Bella doesn't have her mom and it can't be easy. It's not fair."

His mother narrowed her eyes, grabbed his arm and steered him away to a quiet section of the club where their conversation couldn't reach ears and no prying eyes could see it the tension between them.

"I know! Because I was there! I saw Chloe die inside. I saw your dad torture himself under crushing guilt even though it was an accident. I will tell you what it's not fair, Connor," Chelsea argued, angrily. "It isn't fair for you to continue to date her when she's conning you! The bottom is she's controlling you! I spent a good chunk of my life being selfish for my own benefit than I had you and Christian and you two became everything to me! Bella hurts you! That's what she is doing to you! There's something off with her. I feel it. She's coming between you and your brother. ! You know how hard it is for me as it is for as your mother to watch that? Because of Delia," her voice broke, "you can see. I'm asking you right now. Begging. Please open your eyes when Bella is concerned."

Connor watched angry tears fill her eyes, and then push them back.

She continued, softer, touching his face. "She has a hold on you, baby. You're brilliant. You're smart. You have the biggest heart I know, and with all of your issues, you still rise above. I love you so much, Connor. You're a catch and someday, some girl will walk into your life and love you genuinely but Bella isn't it. Open your eyes and see it. Please. Please don't let her poison you anymore. Christian shouldn't have to go through the same thing. It's unhealthy. Bella is making you sicker. Listen to me. Please, honey."

"Christian's fine!" he snapped, picture of him with Bella tonight vivid in his mind. He closed his eyes to keep his anger in cheek and steady his breathing by counting. He mentally counted, making it to fifteen and pushing himself to count up to sixteen. There. Connor felt everything return emotionally to homeostasis. Balance. Perfection and order. He apologized. "Mom, I'm sorry. Christian's a raw subject with me, okay?"

His mother looked at him quizzically, "Why? Why would your brother be a problem?"

"Because he's actively trying to take the woman I love from me!"

She glared at him, sighing, "Connor, get rid of her. I'm not asking you, I'm telling you!"

He might have been disrespectful, but he laughed. The notion was humorous. Connor would never let Bella go. She would let him go either. Bella was right. She was always right. His parents did love Christian more than him, paid him more attention, and valued him more they could ever him. Connor could have cured cancer, ended world hunger and found some brilliant way to eradicate poverty. It wouldn't be enough if Christian eclipsed him in every way that mattered.

"You wouldn't do this to Christian, Mom," he sneered. He chuckled, shaking his head. "Of course, you wouldn't because he's the favourite. You'd encourage him to have Bella so I lose her. Sure, you would because she's not good for me! But perfect for him!"

His mom reared back like he had slapped her.

"Connor," his mother said his name quietly. "Please look at me."

"Why do I have to—"

"I said, look at me! Now!"

So, he did.

"Oh my God, Connor," Chelsea said in quiet realization and alarm in her eyes. "Don't tell me you've stopped taking your medication. You wouldn't do that… You wouldn't…"

Connor put his hands in his pockets and coolly shrugged.

"I would, and I did. I hate the way they make me feel, Mom. I don't want to be drugged up anymore," he explained, as if answering a question about the weather or today's performance on the stock market. He knew both by the way. Connor was organized that way because disorder was bad. Disarray was detrimental. "I don't need the meds."

"Did _Bella_ tell you that?"

"No, she didn't. She just echoed what I've been thinking," Connor clarified. "We're partners, Mom. More than partners. She's my fiancée. You're going to have to find a way to deal with her for real and not just tolerate it. If you love me, you will."

"She's your what?"

"She's engaged. To me. As in, by next year, Bella will be your daughter-in-law."

Chelsea narrowed her eyes in simmering anger. "No!" she answered, vehemently. "No! I forbid it."

He smiled, and kissed her cheek, "It's my life. You don't get a say anymore. If you'll excuse me, I have to go deal with my future father-in-law glaring at me while I try not to drink myself silly and smile. I love you."

Connor sighed, walking away. Everything would have been better if Christian wasn't here. It had to be. It would be better for everyone. As he walked through the crowd to find his lady in red, he marveled at how happy he was and how happy he could continue to be. There was only one way.

 _You should have suffocated him in his crib, Connor. You should have._

* * *

 **charlie ashby**

Detachment.

It was alarmingly easy how it was to do this himself. It was easy for him be comfortable with the life he was entrenched in when Uncle Malcolm wanted him out. Charlie was amazed at how well he could rationalize the divide. Right now, he was Ava's boyfriend getting ready to take her to some party he didn't care, but he needed any excuse to take her out. Not this. Not Uncle Malcolm's second-in-command. Not the temporary guy in charge since Uncle Malcolm was in business in New York.

Suddenly, the weight of the entire Winters organization fell on his shoulders. Charlie walked over to his bar, poured himself a drink and downed it in one gulp. He still felt Frankie and Sam's eyes on him and it annoyed him. Charlie inhaled deeply, and turned around to stare the other two men in the face. Frankie and Sam were the two people in the inner circle he trusted and in some ways, Charlie was wary of them. He had learned very young that was trust was not absolute nor was it concrete. Loyalty was everything and was rewarded, but Charlie worked to stay two or three steps in case, someone was on the brink of switching where their loyalties lay.

Frankie Russo was a slight man. Someone he had known since he and Mattie were eleven years old. Mattie loved Uncle Frankie but remained far removed from what Uncle Malcolm hid behind his façade. Charlie was intrigued by it. He was fascinated by the danger and his curiosity grew with the more knowledge of it he picked it up. It was a secret. It was one that Charlie kept that he grew up the kid who helped everyone, smiled and was known to be a kid who would be kind to everyone. That was true.

He was raised to be a peacemaker as he got older, it was a easy role to be in. Nobody fucked with him because he never did that and he had tolerance for it. it was a rare occurrence to see Charlie Ashby enraged. Charlie was raised to be the one who could see different points of view and merge those perspectives to be the universal friend. Or, according to Katie, friend of friends.

Yet Charlie knew behind that easygoing exterior lay a paradoxical part of himself. This life was ever changing. It was erratic and went from one injury to the injury. One death to the next. One calculated chess match in which the placement of pieces could result in death both ways. Charlie was aware that his calmness under pressure and his ability to be a nice guy was also a danger. He also controlled the chess pieces, moved them before the time to come to do so. Charlie could be alone and navigate this organization and do what had to be done.

Sam was a father figure. He had known Charlie since the age of thirteen. His dad wasn't around of no fault of his own. It was hard to be around when he couldn't be. The closest Charlie got to his father was at the cemetery but he had stopped going. He had to look forward, make sure Mattie was okay and support his mom. Mattie wasn't okay and his mother found reasons to be push forward although the grief would always be there. Sam was the muscle for uncle so Charlie could trust him in contrast to Frankie's figure. Frankie had olive skin, green eyes and a prominent nose. It had a slight bump on the bridge from a break he sustained from a street fight he was involved years decades ago. Sam was a big, hulky man who looked intimidating but was a teddy bear underneath the gruff exterior.

Now, here they are in his living room when Charlie was dressed and about to pick up his girlfriend for a night on the town. They were never going to be at the Club for Michael Baldwin's retirement party. He wanted to take out to a nice restaurant and knew a really cool spot downtown.

"Look, Charlie, Boss is outta town handling somethin' so we gotta have you deal with it," Frank started, in his thick New York accent, "it's a damn shame we gotta drop in like this but it's important."

"There are others to take care of whatever pressing thing is there."

Sam stared in the face, and clapped him on the shoulder, affectionately.

"There's you, Charlie. Just you."

He knew what that meant. Of course, Charlie couldn't leave.

Charlie sighed, "How important?"

Sam looked him in the eyes and said seriously, "Call your girl. Tell her you'll be late."

Charlie looked at Sam, eyes hardened. This was never allowed about to touch Ava. Ever. Like he told Uncle Malcolm, she was a separate entity for all this. She was too good of a person to be touched and tainted by this. So, Charlie worked to protect from it. If Ava and the Organization ever intersected and hurt her, he would never forgive himself. He would hate himself. Knowing that, Charlie knew there would be a time he would have no choice but to break her in order to save her. However, he would prove Uncle Malcolm wrong. But now wasn't it.

"What's goin' down?"

"We had an informant the whole fuckin' time," Frankie told him in disgust. Charlie cursed, anger that usually stayed dormant quietly roused itself. This was something to be taken care of and cut down before it grew out of control. He had to deal with it before it eroded the calm he had worked his life to keep close to him. It was to keep the monster at bay. If it was going to escape from the emotional island, Charlie wanted to control it. "Someone's coming for Boss' territory."

"Who?" Charlie questioned, calmly. His eyes flitted over to the dark mahogany drawer where a .45 chrome semi automatic lay nestled in a locked box. He remembered when his uncle gave it to him as a gift and as a symbol of trust and a token of thanks for his allegiance to the Winters Organization and him. Charlie's eyes went from Frankie to Sam and back to Frankie. "I have to handle this shit and leave my girlfriend. I respect the both of you, but don't waste my time. Who infiltrated us?"

When they told him who had betrayed them, Charlie stared at them for a moment and he made a decision with a nod. Someone close to them had broken their sacred code and for that, there was one only suitable solution. It was a consequence also, depending on the perspective.

He exhaled and shrugged, " _Handle_ it. I'll call you with any additional orders."

Charlie wasn't surprised. He was expecting this.

Charlie watched Sam and Frankie look at each other. He watched a look pass between them and then they turned those eyes on him.

"Okay. Anything else that I have to know about?"

"It's serious and fucked up," Sam disclosed and cursed.

"We were scared to tell you and I'm not scared'a nothin'"

Charlie's heart hammered in his chest but he stayed level-headed.

"Tell me what?"

Sam clapped a strong hand on his shoulder, and stared him in the eye.

"Caleb," Frankie said, grimly setting his jaw. "Your uncle is out."

"What?"

"He escaped. He's been out of Tasmania for some time. No one knows where he is right now."

A chill ran up his spine and settled in his veins. Those veins carried blood similar to his uncle. In Caleb's face, he saw his father and nothing else.

"Go," he ordered, stoically. "I'll handle this myself. Thank you."

Charlie waited until he was alone. There was panic, trepidation, fear of what the hell was going to happen and anger. It was more anger because how the fuck did he not entertain this possibility? Surely, the Australian cattle mob wouldn't have been this foolish. But damnit, they were. That carefully stitched quilt of calm and clarity was unravelling. The patches were being dark stained. A loud tearing noise exploded in his head and Charlie picked up a marbled vase on the center table and threw it against a wall.

He inhaled sharply, the vibrating sound of his phone sounded like the buzzing of a large wasp, circling around in preparation to stinging him. Charlie shook as he pulled it out. The iPhone slipped through unusually clumsy fingers and clattered on his floor. Charlie bent down to pick it up and began to frantically sew his security blanket together while centering himself.

To be a monster or let the monster become him. That was the question.

—

"Hey, what's up?" Charlie greeted and went into that default easy-going demeanor. He let the sound of his girlfriend's voice rest in his ears, and slowly drip into his veins like morphine. It could have the potential to be poison.

"We still on for tonight?"

"Yeah, yeah. I'm still down if you were."

In his mind, Ava rolled her beautiful eyes and laughed. "Of course, but can we meet up at the hospital?"

Charlie's heart slowly started to race and he felt his stomach lurch.

"Hospital?" he questioned, unable to keep the panic out of his voice. "Holy shit. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah," Ava assured him and explained why she was there. "I was waiting for you, and my dad texted me to let me know he was back from Australia. He was there for some medical conference and to see my brother, Max. My niece was just born so he went down there to see her."

Charlie let himself let out a sigh of relief. Ava was fine. Of course, Ava would go to the hospital. She was working to follow in her dad's footsteps and she was a doctor's kid.

"Oh. Okay," Charlie replied, and winced at a pain that was physically felt in his head. It was a light throbbing that sharp undertones. It was as if his beloved football cleats had turned him. Instead of giving traction to ran around and take his opponents down, the spiked bottoms took him down with pain blooming. "Yeah, I'm totally cool with meeting at the hospital."

"Great. We can drive to the Club in separate cars—"

"Ava," Charlie started, cutting her off, "I'm not in the mood to go to the club anymore. Seems like we'd be going just because we have to. I think it will go on without us. Besides, Mattie just flew in tonight and something came up with her."

She was silent on the phone and then sounded surprised.

"Mattie…is back?"

"Yeah. She's at my mom's for the time being."

"You'd think she would call her roomie and give her a heads up."

Now, it was her turn to reassure her in the midst of re-assuring himself.

"I'm pretty sure she has her reasons."

"You're her twin."

"Baby, she will tell you in her own time," he sighed, heaviness in his chest. An internal weight the size of Australia settled behind his sternum. "I'm going to meet you at the hospital. You're sure nothing's wrong?"

"Yes, I'm fine. I'm only here because of my dad. Are you okay?"

Charlie resisted the urge to throw up. Caleb was the Claudius to his Hamlet and he didn't ask for it. In some ways, he had by making this crucial decision. He didn't want to separate himself from it. There was too power entrusted to him and too much numbness seeping into him when he entered that bubble of organized crime. It was a bubble with thin walls and Caleb's bloody hands could pop it. He forced a smile.

"What?"

"I'm just wondering if you're okay."

"Uh," Charlie answered, his eyes staring fixedly at a drawer. "Yeah. I'm going to be a little later. There's something I need to handle. I'll be fast."

"Okay. See you soon," Ava said, finally and Charlie held on to the imagine of the warm sunshine in her smile and the halo above her head. "Just don't make me miss you too much."

This time his smile was genuine. "I won't."

Charlie hung up and exhaled. Pocketing his phone, he strode over to his drawer and pulled out a medium sized black box. The chrome gun rested safely in its dark velvet. Suddenly, he was operating in autopilot and he could detach himself. He put Ava in a little radiant and buried it in the darkness that grew as the roaring grew louder and caused a sort of pressure and throbbing in his temple. He could feel it but it didn't hurt. Using the heel of his hand, Charlie pushed the magazine into the gun, the metal icy in his palm.

There was just comfortable stoicism now.

Charlie shoved the gun into the waist band of his pants from the back, adjusted his jacket and stepped over the remains of the vase his mother gave him. He calmly opened the door to his apartment and let his door close behind him. His phone buzzed again, and Charlie pulled it, furrowing a brow. He grew curious until he wasn't anymore. Two words made Charlie's free hand curl into a fist until his knuckles ached, begging to collide any surface. Anything for some kind of sweet release.

—

 **Unknown**  
Hello, nephew.


End file.
